e it. Dare you come with me?"

This staggered me. A man does not like to prove such a truth, Byron
excepted from the category, jealousy.

"And prove the very truth he most abhorred."

He saw my hesitation, and spoke, "The logic is simple, no madman's
logic this time, jumping from tussock to tussock in a misty bog. If
it not be true, then proof will be relief. At worst it will not harm.
If it be true! Ah, there is the dread. Yet every dread should help my
cause, for in it is some need of belief. Come, I tell you what I
propose. First, that we go off now and see that child in the
hospital. Dr. Vincent, of the North Hospital, where the papers say
the child is, is a friend of mine, and I think of yours since you were
in class at Amsterdam. He will let two scientists see his case, if he
will not let two friends. We shall tell him nothing, but only that we
wish to learn. And then . . ."

"And then?"

He took a key from his pocket and held it up. "And then we spend the
night, you and I, in the churchyard where Lucy lies. This is the key
that lock the tomb. I had it from the coffin man to give to Arthur."

My heart sank within me, for I felt that there was some fearful ordeal
before us. I could do nothing, however, so I plucked up what heart I
could and said that we had better hasten, as the afternoon was
passing.

We found the child awake. It had had a sleep and taken some food, and
altogether was going on well. Dr. Vincent took the bandage from its
throat, and showed us the punctures. There was no mistaking the
similarity to those which had been on Lucy's throat. They were
smaller, and the edges looked fresher, that was all. We asked Vincent
to what he attributed them, and he replied that it must have been a
bite of some animal, perhaps a rat, but for his own part, he was
inclined to think it was one of the bats which are so numerous on the
northern heights of London. "Out of so many harmless ones," he said,
"there may be some wild specimen from the South of a more malignant
species. Some sailor may have brought one home, and it managed to
escape, or even from the Zoological Gardens a young one may have got
loose, or one be bred there from a vampire. These things do occur,
you, know. Only ten days ago a wolf got out, and was, I believe,
traced up in this direction. For a week after, the children were
playing nothing but Red Riding Hood on the Heath and in every alley in
the place until t