one more grain of reason leaves me. Like him, I might have
been a leader of men. Like him, I have power and capability. I have a
brain that could have raised me to the greatest heights. I have a body
that can bear any strain. But I am mad."

His agony was pitiful. He sobbed, wringing his hands.

"I can feel the hideous thing growing in me, hour by hour--a little
more--a little more. I can feel its clutch tightening on me. And I can't
resist. I can't escape. The little mental balance I have is being
dragged away from me. In a few years--if I let myself live to it--I
shall be a babbling maniac. Nothing can save me. I knew it when I was a
boy--before that thing there completely lost its reason. I knew I was
born a madman for my father's sins. It crept on me gradually--one sign
after another--one horrible secret impulse after another. The slow, sure
growth of madness." He buried his face in his hands. "Oh, God! Oh,
God!"

In the silence that followed the figure on the chair straightened itself
with a jerk, and gibbered at him, twitching spasmodically. The woman
turned away, shaking.

"I live in hell," he moaned--"in all the torment of the uttermost hell.
I fly from one thing to another for respite, for relief--but there is no
relief. I can only make madness of them all. Everything twists and turns
in my hands. I can keep nothing straight." Then another gust of passion
seized him. He shouted, beating his hands together. "What right," he
cried furiously, "have men and women to marry and bequeath disease and
madness to their children? What right have they to propagate the
rottenness of their minds and bodies? It's worse than murder. It's the
cruelest, the most wicked, of all crimes. What are the feelings of a
child to such parents? Is it not to hate them--as I hate that foul thing
there?--to curse them, as I curse him, with every breath?" His arms
dropped limply to his sides. "What is the use of hating?" he said dully.
"It can't cure me. It can't cure me."

He looked at her fixedly.

"Well?" he asked bitterly. "You know the secrets of my house. Are you
satisfied?"

She laid a hand on his arm, and turned him gently towards the door.
There were tears in her eyes.

"Come away," she said weakly. "Let us speak somewhere else."

He followed her. They went out, without another look at the figure
behind them, and returned in silence to the black room.

CHAPTER XXV

TRUER COLORS

A great change had come over he