m a fiend to let this continue? No; it must end--it must end
on the gallows."

"_He_ died on the gallows!"

"He? Whom are you talking about? Try to make sense, Carse. I am your
friend; trust me."

"I am talking of Emil Drukker--the man who taught me how to do these
things. He is responsible for them, not I. He is the one to hang for
them. Dig him out of his grave and hang him again!"

~ ~ ~

I pushed him gently into a chair, for his collapse seemed imminent.
Spittle was running from his mouth, and his retching continued in
spasms that shook him to his teeth.

"I am your friend," I told him again. "I want to help you, but you
must get control of yourself. Why do you say you are not responsible?
What drove you to commit these crimes?"

He looked at me searchingly and his eyes cleared. He swallowed a mass
of incoherent words in an effort to master himself; then his hand
pressed over mine.

"You are right; I must get control of myself," he said. "I have done
some horrible things which can never be forgiven, but I swear to you
that I have not done them intentionally. And I am not mad as you
think. I am in the power of that book. I am the puppet of a horror
that has outlived all natural deaths."

A feeling of relief passed over me as I saw him settle into a state of
rational observation. I hoped it would last, for not three yards away
from him, lying on top of the kitchen table, was a seven-inch butcher
knife. My only hope was to preserve his state by permitting him to
tell his story, and in that way to persuade him to accept the
inevitable consequences of his crimes. I drew up a chair beside his
own, yet kept myself alert to ward off any lunge he might make for the
knife.

"What is this horror which has mastered you?" I asked in an effort to
gain his confidence. "And what is this book?"

"I told you about it in my letter from Vienna six weeks ago. I told
you I had discovered a rare book--an awful and compelling book. It was
the diary of Emil Drukker."

"Where did you get it?"

He cast a swift glance about the room, then suddenly his eyes fell
upon the butcher knife. I saw him tense, saw his lips twitch under the
lash of a horrible temptation.

"Carse, tell me about it!" I yelled, to distract him. "Where did you
get the book?"

He pulled his eyes away from the knife and let them burn into my face.
For a moment, undecided, he was silent; then his brows straightened
and he leaned forward in hi