ng while he looked silently at Dr. Porhoet.

'What is it, my friend?' asked the good doctor at length.

'Do you remember that you told us once of an experiment you made in
Alexandria?' he said, after some hesitation.

He spoke in a curious voice.

'You told us that you took a boy, and when he looked in a magic mirror,
he saw things which he could not possibly have known.'

'I remember very well,' said the doctor.

'I was much inclined to laugh at you at the time. I was convinced that
the boy was a knave who deceived you.'

'Yes?'

'Of late I've thought of that story often. Some hidden recess of my
memory has been opened, and I seem to remember strange things. Was I
the boy who looked in the ink?'

'Yes,' said the doctor quietly.

Arthur did not say anything. A profound silence fell upon them, while
Susie and the doctor watched him intently. They wondered what was in his
mind.

'There is a side of my character which I did not know till lately,'
Arthur said at last. 'When first it dawned upon me, I fought against it.
I said to myself that deep down in all of us, a relic from the long past,
is the remains of the superstition that blinded our fathers; and it is
needful for the man of science to fight against it with all his might.
And yet it was stronger than I. Perhaps my birth, my early years, in
those Eastern lands where everyone believes in the supernatural, affected
me although I did not know it. I began to remember vague, mysterious
things, which I never knew had been part of my knowledge. And at last one
day it seemed that a new window was opened on to my soul, and I saw with
extraordinary clearness the incident which you had described. I knew
suddenly it was part of my own experience. I saw you take me by the hand
and pour the ink on my palm and bid me look at it. I felt again the
strange glow that thrilled me, and with an indescribable bitterness I saw
things in the mirror which were not there before. I saw people whom I had
never seen. I saw them perform certain actions. And some force I knew
not, obliged me to speak. And at length everything grew dim, and I was as
exhausted as if I had not eaten all day.'

He went over to the open window and looked out. Neither of the others
spoke. The look on Arthur's face, curiously outlined by the light of the
lamp, was very stern. He seemed to undergo some mental struggle of
extraordinary violence. He breath came quickly. At last he turned and
faced them. He sp