t night all round it.

I was awed rather than frightened. There was one moment, and one only,
when the fear came to me that my reason might be shaken. I caught
myself keeping time to the slow tramp of the horse's feet with the slow
utterances of these words, repeated over and over again: "Jeromette is
dead. Jeromette is dead." But my will was still my own: I was able to
control myself, to impose silence on my own muttering lips. And I rode
on quietly. And the pillar of mist went quietly with me.

My groom was waiting for my return at the rectory gate. I pointed to the
mist, passing through the gate with me.

"Do you see anything there?" I said.

The man looked at me in astonishment.

I entered the rectory. The housekeeper met me in the hall. I pointed to
the mist, entering with me.

"Do you see anything at my side?" I asked.

The housekeeper looked at me as the groom had looked at me.

"I am afraid you are not well, sir," she said. "Your color is all
gone--you are shivering. Let me get you a glass of wine."

I went into my study, on the ground-floor, and took the chair at my
desk. The photograph still lay where I had left it. The pillar of
mist floated round the table, and stopped opposite to me, behind the
photograph.

The housekeeper brought in the wine. I put the glass to my lips, and
set it down again. The chill of the mist was in the wine. There was
no taste, no reviving spirit in it. The presence of the housekeeper
oppressed me. My dog had followed her into the room. The presence of the
animal oppressed me. I said to the woman: "Leave me by myself, and take
the dog with you."

They went out, and left me alone in the room.

I sat looking at the pillar of mist, hovering opposite to me.

It lengthened slowly, until it reached to the ceiling. As it lengthened,
it grew bright and luminous. A time passed, and a shadowy appearance
showed itself in the center of the light. Little by little, the shadowy
appearance took the outline of a human form. Soft brown eyes, tender and
melancholy, looked at me through the unearthly light in the mist. The
head and the rest of the face broke next slowly on my view. Then
the figure gradually revealed itself, moment by moment, downward and
downward to the feet. She stood before me as I had last seen her, in
her purple-merino dress, with the black-silk apron, with the white
handkerchief tied loosely round her neck. She stood before me, in the
gentle beauty that I remembere