ier and I held a long sword in my hand. I was conscious of pain
and great weakness. Creeping stealthily from recess to recess, window to
window, I would approach the double doors at the end of the salon. There
I would pause, my heart throbbing fiercely, and press my ear to the
gaily painted panels. A murmur of conversation would seem to proceed
from the room beyond, but forced onward by some urgent necessity, the
nature of which I could never recall upon awakening, I would suddenly
throw the doors widely open and hurl myself into a small ante-room. A
fire of logs blazed in the open hearth, and some six or eight musketeers
lounged about the place, hats, baldrics, swords and cloaks lying
discarded upon tables, chairs and where not. All sprang to their feet as
I entered, and one, a huge red fellow, snatched up his sword and stood
before a low door on the right of the room which I sought to approach.
We crossed blades ... and with their metallic clash sounding in my ears
I invariably awoke. I have spoken of this to you, Yvonne?"

Paul glanced rapidly at Yvonne but proceeded immediately without waiting
for a reply. "As Thessaly and I were conducted to our rooms on the night
of which I am speaking, I found myself traversing the salon of my
dreams!"

"Most extraordinary," muttered Bassett. "Nothing about the aspect of the
other rooms of the chateau had struck you as familiar?"

"Nothing; except that I was glad to be there. I cannot make clear to you
the almost sorrowful veneration with which I entered the gate. It was
like that of a wayward son who returns, broken, to the home upon which
he has brought sorrow, to find himself welcomed by his first confessor,
old, feeble, lonely, but filled with sweet compassion. I ascribed this
emotion to the atmosphere of a stately home abandoned by its owners. But
the salon revealed the truth to me. Heavy plush curtains were drawn
across the windows, but the flames of three candles in a silver
candelabra carried by the servant created just such a half-light as I
remembered. I paused, questioning the accuracy of my recollections, but
it was all real, unmistakable. We passed through the doorway at the end
of the salon--and there was my guardroom! A modern stove had taken the
place of the old open hearth, and the furniture was totally different,
but I knew the room. The servant crossed before me to a door which I
could not recall having noticed in my dream. As he opened it I looked to
the rig