earing
in the sporting pages, a swaggering member of the upper set--a man who
had been engaged to nearly every beautiful woman in the country--who
sought adventure in sport and in night life, merely for the sake of
living at top speed. And here he stood before me, whitened by fear, the
very thing he had so deliberately laughed at!

"Dale," he said slowly, "for the past week I have been thinking things
that I do not want to think and doing things completely against my will.
Some outside power--God knows what it is--is controlling my very
existence."

He stared it me, and leaned closer across the table.

"Last night, some time before midnight," he told me, "I was sitting
alone in my den. Alone, mind you--not a soul was in the house with me.
I was reading a novel; and suddenly, as if a living presence had stood
in the room and commanded me, I was forced to put the book down. I
fought against it, fought to remain in that room and go on reading. And
I failed."

"Failed?" My reply was a single word of wonder.

* * * * *

"I left my home: because I could not help myself. Have you ever been
under hypnotism, Dale? Yes? Well, the thing that gripped me was
something similar--except that no living person came near me in order to
work his hypnotic spell. I went alone, the whole way. Through back
streets, alleys, filthy dooryards--never once striking a main
thoroughfare--until I had crossed the entire city and reached the west
side of the square. And there, before a big gray town-house, I was
allowed to stop my mad wandering. The power, whatever it was, broke.
I--well, I went home."

Sir John got to his feet with an effort, and stood over me.

"Dale," he whispered hoarsely, "what was it?"

"You were conscious of every detail?" I asked. "Conscious of the time,
of the locality you went to? You are sure it was not some fantastic
dream?"

"Dream! Is it a dream to have some damnable force move me about like a
mechanical robot?"

"But.... You can think of no explanation?" I was a bit skeptical of his
story.

He turned on me savagely.

"I have no explanation. Doctor," he said curtly. "I came to you for the
explanation. And while you are thinking over my case during the next few
hours, perhaps you can explain this: when I stood before that gray
mansion on After Street, alone in the dark, there was murder in my
heart. I should have killed the man who lived in that house, had I not
been suddenl