y right! Yes,
every solitary soul has a right to _live_, even if it lives to wreck,
kill, madden its parents! And now, oh, God, I've got my revenge when I
no longer want it! The way you took me in, the way you wanted me to stay
when I'd almost frightened you to death, made me want to spare you! It
was my fate that I--I liked you--I--_more_ than liked you. And I tried
to save you! Oh, God, God, _how_ I've tried!"

As he stood with his hands thrown forth again and his wretched eyes
staring into those of the white-faced man, Henry Montagu met the wild
gaze unflinchingly. He had sat dumbstruck and shuddering, but the
spasmodic quivering of his body had lessened into calmness, and his
whispered, slow words gained in steadiness as they came: "My boy, I
admit you've nearly driven me to madness just now. I was close to the
border! I can't dispute one shred of reproach, of accusation, of
contempt. Your fearful explanation of this night, the awful import of
your visit and yourself have shaken me to the center of my being. But
its huge consistency is that of a madman. You poor, you pitiful, deluded
boy, you tell me to believe you are an unborn soul, while you stand
there and exist before my eyes!"

The boy gave a cry of agony--agony so immortal that as he sank into his
chair and clutched the table, an echoing moan of it wrenched from the
older man.

"I _don't_ exist! Didn't I tell you my secret was more terrible than any
living heart had ever held? I'm real to you since I made you let me into
your thoughts to-night. I'm real to you, and through your last moment of
consciousness through eternity I always will be! But I won't be with
you! You don't believe me yet, but the moment you do, I won't be here!
And I never can be real to any other creature in the universe--_not even
that prostitute who refused to be my mother_! I don't exist, and never
can exist!"

"But you do! You do! You do! You're there before me now!" gasped Mr.
Montagu through chattering teeth. "How can you deny that you're sitting
here with me in this restaurant? I forgive you--I love you, and I
forgive you, but, thank God, _I see through you at last_! You're a
fanatic, a poor, frenzied maniac on this subject, and you've morbidly
spied on and studied me as a typical case of it; through your devilish
understanding and divination you've guessed at that conversation between
me and my wife, and like the creature I pictured you in my house, a
ravening, devouring thing