hat told about the Brown Bess musket and the powder
horn and the ball shot inside.

But the little white card lied in its teeth. There weren't any such
things in the case at all. And he'd notified the curator at once.

There was also mention of a mysterious phone call which couldn't be
traced.

Things like this don't happen in 1953. So I didn't get loaded that
night. I went home, went to the davenport, sat down and told myself
they don't happen. Things like this have never happened, will never
happen. What occurred last night was something in the bottom of a
bottle of Jamaica rum.

"Thinking, Mr. Anders?"

I took a slow breath. He was swaying gently in the air a foot from my
elbow and he was still a black mucous scum, as he had been the night
before. I got up.

I said, "I'm not loaded tonight. I haven't had a thing all day." I
took two steps toward him.

He wasn't there.

I took another breath--a very very slow breath. I turned around and
went back to the davenport.

He was back again.

"They'll find that musket," he said. "I have no use for it now. You
see I wanted it only to convince you, Mr. Anders."

I put my hands on my knees and didn't look at him. I was suddenly
trying to remember where I'd put that Luger I'd brought home from
Germany a couple years back.

"You're not quite convinced yet, Mr. Anders?"

_Where in the hell did I put it?_

"Very well, Mr. Anders. Now hear this, please. Now watch me." He
stirred at about hip height. A shelf-like section of the black mass
protruded a little distance from the main part of him. On this shelf
suddenly lay a rusted penknife.

"A very little boy, Mr. Anders. And a very long while ago. A talented
boy, one of those who has what might be called an exceptional
imagination. This boy cherished a penknife when he was quite small.
Pick up the knife, Mr. Anders."

The knife was suddenly in my lap. I picked it up. It was rusty. It had
a flat bone handle. "Museums again," I whispered to myself.

"So highly did this boy prize his knife that he went to great pains to
carve his name very very carefully on one side of the bone handle.
Turn the knife over, Mr. Anders."

The name was Edward Anders.

"You lost it when you were eleven. You wouldn't remember though. I
found it in an attic where it lay unnoticed. As the years went by you
gradually forgot about the knife, you see, and when your mind had
completely abandoned the thoughts of it, it was mine--had I wante