there was a madman in the house.

* * * * *

But all that had happened seven years ago, and now Andrew Henderson lay
waiting for his end. In those seven years John had passed through the
mill of deadly monotony that saps even youth, and lulls every instinct
save hope. The first enthusiasm of romance that had wrapped the
discovery of his uncle's secret had faded out with time. By slow degrees
he had learned--partly from his own observation, partly from the old
man's occasional fanatic outbursts--that the strange chapel with its
metal symbol and marble floor was not the outcome of a private whim, but
the manifestation of a creed that boasted a small but ardent band of
followers. He had learned that--to themselves, if not to the
world--these devotees were known as the Mystics; that their articles of
faith were preserved in a secret book designated the Scitsym, which
passed in rotation each year from one to another of the six
Arch-Mystics, remaining in the care of each for two months out of the
twelve. He had discovered that London was the Centre of this sect; and
that its fundamental belief was the anticipation of a mysterious
prophet--human, and yet divinely inspired--by whose coming the light was
to extend from the small and previously unknown band across the whole
benighted world.

He had learned all these things. He had been stirred to a passing awe by
the discovery that his uncle was, in his own person, actually one of the
profound Six who formed the Council of the sect and to whom alone the
secrets of its creed were known; and for three successive years his
interest and curiosity had been kindled when Andrew Henderson travelled
to England and returned with the Arch-Councillor--an old blind man of
seventy--who invariably spent one day and night mysteriously closeted
with his host and then left, having deposited the sacred Scitsym with
his own hands in the tall iron safe that stood in Henderson's study. But
that annual excitement had lessened with time. Even a madman may become
monotonous when we live with him, day in, day out, for seven long years;
and gradually the attitude of John's mind had changed with the passage
of time. The sense of adventure and triumphant enterprise had steadily
receded; the knowledge that he was working out a slow, distasteful
probation had advanced. Reluctantly and yet definitely he had realized
that his position was not to come and conquer, but to watch an