ut it was far different when we afterward reasoned
together about the purpose which the apparition had come to fulfill--far
different when she showed me that its mission might be for good instead
of for evil, and that the warning it was sent to give might be to my
profit instead of to my loss. At those words, the new idea which gave
the new hope of life came to me in an instant. I believed then, what I
believe now, that I have a supernatural warrant for my errand here. In
that faith I live; without it I should die. _She_ never ridiculed it,
never scorned it as insanity. Mark what I say! The spirit that appeared
to me in the Abbey--that has never left me since--that stands there now
by your side, warns me to escape from the fatality which hangs over our
race, and commands me, if I would avoid it, to bury the unburied dead.
Mortal loves and mortal interests must bow to that awful bidding. The
specter-presence will never leave me till I have sheltered the corpse
that cries to the earth to cover it! I dare not return--I dare not marry
till I have filled the place that is empty in Wincot vault."

His eyes flashed and dilated--his voice deepened--a fanatic ecstasy
shone in his expression as he uttered these words. Shocked and grieved
as I was, I made no attempt to remonstrate or to reason with him.
It would have been useless to have referred to any of the usual
commonplaces about optical delusions or diseased imaginations--worse
than useless to have attempted to account by natural causes for any
of the extraordinary coincidences and events of which he had spoken.
Briefly as he had referred to Miss Elmslie, he had said enough to show
me that the only hope of the poor girl who loved him best and had known
him longest of any one was in humoring his delusions to the last. How
faithfully she still clung to the belief that she could restore him!
How resolutely was she sacrificing herself to his morbid fancies, in the
hope of a happy future that might never come! Little as I knew of Miss
Elmslie, the mere thought of her situation, as I now reflected on it,
made me feel sick at heart.

"They call me Mad Monkton!" he exclaimed, suddenly breaking the silence
between us during the last few minutes, "Here and in England everybody
believes I am out of my senses except Ada and you. She has been my
salvation, and you will be my salvation too. Something told me that
when I first met you walking in the Villa Peale. I struggled against
the st