face like chalk, shakin' an' sweatin' an' starin'
at me. His eyes were all big an' flat; an' I lay there an' looked at
him, while he bit his lips an' got a hold on himself. At last 'e come
over to me. ''Ow are you feeling?' 'e says. I'd been thinking. 'You
devil, you've brought me back,' I shouted. He was shakin' still like
a flag in the wind. 'Yes,' he says, 'unless I'm mad, I've brought you
back.' I 'adn't the strength to do no more than lie still; so I just
watched 'im while 'e got brandy and drank it from the bottle. Oh, I
remember; I remember the whole thing. That Fish can fool you an' old
Pond, but there's no foolin' me. I know!"

He leaned forward and spat; the gesture emphasised the hard
deliberation of his speech. The look he gave her now was much more
assured than her own.

"We must be getting back," Mary said uneasily. She remembered what
Professor Fish had mentioned of Smith's delusions. But the
strangeness and assurance of what he had said were not in accord with
what she knew of unstable minds.

He rose and accompanied her docilely enough, but the strength that
had furnished him with force to speak seemed to last only while he
was in the churchyard. As they went along the quiet road he was again
the flimsy, unlovely shell of a man she had first known. They went
slowly, for Mary accommodated her gait to his; he walked weakly,
looking down always. Where the road passed the end of the village a
few people turned to look after them with slow curiosity. The village
policeman, chin in hand, stared with bovine intensity; his big,
simple face was clenched in careful observation. Mary recalled Harry
Wylde's story, and his warning that the authorities had been seeking
for Smith; she quickened her pace a little to get out of that mild
publicity.

"What were you before you--before you met Professor Fish?" she asked
him suddenly.

"A bettin' tout," he answered, "and a thief." He spoke absently and
with complete composure.

"Well," said Mary, "will you do something for me if I ask you?"

He looked aside at her. "Don't ask," he said. "Don't ask me to do
anything. 'Cos I can't."

"It's only this," said Mary. "What you told me in the churchyard was
very wonderful and dreadful; but even if it was true, it would be a
bad thing for you to think much about. It couldn't help you to live;
it could only come between you and being well. So I want you, as far
as you can, not to think about it. Try to forget it. Will you