e
is so precious to man."

I took the book from his hand, and flung it aside in wrath. His approval
revolted me more with my own theories than all the argumentative rebukes
of Faber.

"And now," I said, sternly, "the time has come for the explanation
you promised. Before I can aid you in any experiment that may serve to
prolong your life, I must know how far that life has been a baleful and
destroying influence?"

"I have some faint recollection of having saved your life from an
imminent danger, and if gratitude were the attribute of man, as it is of
the dog, I should claim your aid to serve mine as a right. Ask me what
you will. You must have seen enough of me to know that I do not affect
either the virtues or vices of others. I regard both with so supreme an
indifference, that I believe I am vicious or virtuous unawares. I know
not if I can explain what seems to have perplexed you, but if I cannot
explain I have no intention to lie. Speak--I listen! We have time enough
now before us."

So saying, he reclined back in the chair, stretching out his limbs
wearily. All round this spoilt darling of Material Nature were the
aids and appliances of Intellectual Science,--books and telescopes
and crucibles, with the light of day coming through a small circular
aperture in the boarded casement, as I had constructed the opening for
my experimental observation of the prismal rays.

While I write, his image is as visible before my remembrance as if
before the actual eye,--beautiful even in its decay, awful even in its
weakness, mysterious as is Nature herself amidst all the mechanism by
which our fancied knowledge attempts to measure her laws and analyze her
light.

But at that moment no such subtle reflections delayed my inquisitive
eager mind from its immediate purpose,--who and what was this creature
boasting of a secret through which I might rescue from death the life of
her who was my all upon the earth?

I gathered rapidly and succinctly together all that I knew and all that
I guessed of Margrave's existence and arts. I commenced from my vision
in that mimic Golgotha of creatures inferior to man, close by the scene
of man's most trivial and meaningless pastime. I went on,--Derval's
murder; the missing contents of the casket; the apparition seen by the
maniac assassin guiding him to the horrid deed; the luminous haunting
shadow; the positive charge in the murdered man's memoir connecting
Margrave with Louis Grayle, a