nfluence, sinuous and dark, as when a clouded streak
seams the white marble of a perfect statue.

It would be needless to repeat the particular suggestions which had come
into his mind, as they must probably have come into that of the reader
who has noted the singularities of Elsie's tastes and personal traits.
The images which certain poets had dreamed of seemed to have become a
reality before his own eyes. Then came that unexplained adventure of The
Mountain,--almost like a dream in recollection, yet assuredly real in
some of its main incidents,--with all that it revealed or hinted. This
girl did not fear to visit the dreaded region, where danger lurked in
every nook and beneath every tuft of leaves. Did the tenants of the
fatal ledge recognize some mysterious affinity which made them tributary
to the cold glitter of her diamond eyes? Was she from her birth one of
those frightful children, such as he had read about, and the Professor
had told him of, who form unnatural friendships with cold, writhing
ophidians? There was no need of so unwelcome a thought as this; she had
drawn him away from the dark opening in the rock at the moment when he
seemed to be threatened by one of its malignant denizens; that was all he
could be sure of; the counter-fascination might have been a dream, a
fancy, a coincidence. All wonderful things soon grow doubtful in our own
minds, as do even common events, if great interests prove suddenly to
attach to their truth or falsehood.

--I, who am telling of these occurrences, saw a friend in the great city,
on the morning of a most memorable disaster, hours after the time when
the train which carried its victims to their doom had left. I talked with
him, and was for some minutes, at least, in his company. When I reached
home, I found that the story had gone before that he was among the lost,
and I alone could contradict it to his weeping friends and relatives. I
did contradict it; but, alas! I began soon to doubt myself, penetrated
by the contagion of their solicitude; my recollection began to question
itself; the order of events became dislocated; and when I heard that he
had reached home in safety, the relief was almost as great to me as to
those who had expected to see their own brother's face no more.

Mr. Bernard was disposed, then, not to accept the thought of any odious
personal relationship of the kind which had suggested itself to him when
he wrote the letter referred to. Tha