the
mischief is consummated already; and we, I think, risk nothing worse
than death. But you will need another knife a little later--a knife
that will be clean."

"I had forgotten." Borsdale withdrew, and presently returned with a
bone-handled knife. And then he made a light. "Are you quite ready,
sir?"

Sir Thomas Browne, that aging amateur of the curious, could not resist
a laugh.

And then they sat about proceedings of which, for obvious reasons, the
details are best left unrecorded. It was not an unconscionable while
before they seemed to be aware of unusual phenomena. But as Sir Thomas
always pointed out, in subsequent discussions, these were quite
possibly the fruitage of excited imagination.

"Now, Philip!--now, give me the knife!" cried Sir Thomas Browne. He
knew for the first time, despite many previous mischancy happenings,
what real terror was.

The room was thick with blinding smoke by this, so that Borsdale could
see nothing save his co-partner in this adventure. Both men were
shaken by what had occurred before. Borsdale incuriously perceived
that old Sir Thomas rose, tense as a cat about to pounce, and that he
caught the unstained knife from Borsdale's hand, and flung it like a
javelin into the vapor which encompassed them. This gesture stirred
the smoke so that Borsdale could see the knife quiver and fall, and
note the tiny triangle of unbared plaster it had cut in the painted
woman's breast. Within the same instant he had perceived a naked man
who staggered.

"_Iz adu kronyeshnago_----!" The intruder's thin, shrill wail was that
of a frightened child. The man strode forward, choked, seemed to grope
his way. His face was not good to look at. Horror gripped and tore at
every member of the cadaverous old body, as a high wind tugs at a flag.
The two witnesses of Herrick's agony did not stir during the instant
wherein the frenzied man stooped, moving stiffly like an ill-made toy,
and took up the knife.

"Oh, yes, I knew what he was about to do," said Sir Thomas Browne
afterward, in his quiet fashion. "I did not try to stop him. If
Herrick had been my dearest friend, I would not have interfered. I had
seen his face, you comprehend. Yes, it was kinder to let him die. It
was curious, though, as he stood there hacking his chest, how at each
stab he deliberately twisted the knife. I suppose the pain distracted
his mind from what he was remembering. I should have forewarned
Borsdale