s an expression of fixed
horror. The Father started at the sight of him, and could scarcely
refrain from crying out. He was beginning to express his sympathy when
Guildea stopped him with a trembling gesture.

"I know all that," Guildea said, "I know. This Paris affair----" He
faltered and stopped.

"You ought never to have gone," said the Father. "I was wrong. I ought
not to have advised your going. You were not fit."

"I was perfectly fit," he answered, with the irritability of sickness.
"But I was--I was accompanied by that abominable thing."

He glanced hastily round him, shifted his chair and pulled the rug
higher over his knees. The Father wondered why he was thus wrapped up.
For the fire was bright and red and the night was not very cold.

"I was accompanied to Paris," he continued, pressing his upper teeth
upon his lower lip.

He paused again, obviously striving to control himself. But the effort
was vain. There was no resistance in the man. He writhed in his chair
and suddenly burst forth in a tone of hopeless lamentation.

"Murchison, this being, thing--whatever it is--no longer leaves me even
for a moment. It will not stay here unless I am here, for it loves me,
persistently, idiotically. It accompanied me to Paris, stayed with me
there, pursued me to the lecture hall, pressed against me, caressed me
while I was speaking. It has returned with me here. It is here now,"--he
uttered a sharp cry,--"now, as I sit here with you. It is nestling up to
me, fawning upon me, touching my hands. Man, man, can't you feel that it
is here?"

"No," the Father answered truly.

"I try to protect myself from its loathsome contact," Guildea continued,
with fierce excitement, clutching the thick rug with both hands. "But
nothing is of any avail against it. Nothing. What is it? What can it be?
Why should it have come to me that night?"

"Perhaps as a punishment," said the Father, with a quick softness.

"For what?"

"You hated affection. You put human feelings aside with contempt. You
had, you desired to have, no love for anyone. Nor did you desire to
receive any love from anything. Perhaps this is a punishment."

Guildea stared into his face.

"D'you believe that?" he cried.

"I don't know," said the Father. "But it may be so. Try to endure it,
even to welcome it. Possibly then the persecution will cease."

"I know it means me no harm," Guildea exclaimed, "it seeks me out of
affection. It was led to me by some