that he had followed into the swamp. And
this was no ordinary marsh. It was, he added aloud, "A swamp of
souls."

"Then," she replied, "we must leave at once."

A dragging sound rose from the hall. Millie Stope cowered in a
voiceless accession of terror; but John Woolfolk, lamp in hand, moved
to the door. He was curious to see exactly what was happening. The
bulk had risen; a broad back swayed like a pendulum, and a swollen
hand gripped the stair rail. The form heaved itself up a step, paused,
tottering, and then mounted again. Woolfolk saw at once that the other
was going for the knife buried in the wall above. He watched with an
impersonal interest the dragging ascent. At the seventh step it
ceased; the figure crumpled, slid halfway back to the floor.

"You can't do it," Woolfolk observed critically.

The other sat bowed, with one leg extended stiffly downward, on
the stair that mounted from the pale radiance of the lamp into
impenetrable darkness. Woolfolk moved back into the room and replaced
the lamp on its table. Millie Stope still stood with open, hanging
hands, a countenance of expectant dread. Her eyes did not shift
from the door as he entered and passed her; her gaze hung starkly on
what might emerge from the hall.

A deep loathing of his surroundings swept over John Woolfolk, a sudden
revulsion from the dead man on the floor, from the ponderous menace on
the stair, the white figure that had brought it all upon him. A
mounting horror of the place possessed him, and he turned and
incontinently fled. A complete panic enveloped him at his flight, a
blind necessity to get away, and he ran heedlessly through the night,
with head up and arms extended. His feet struck upon a rotten fragment
of board that broke beneath him, he pushed through a tangle of grass,
and then his progress was held by soft and dragging sand. A moment
later he was halted by a chill flood rising abruptly to his knees. He
drew back sharply and fell on the beach, with his heels in the water
of the bay.

An insuperable weariness pinned him down, a complete exhaustion of
brain and body. A heavy wind struck like a wet cloth on his face. The
sky had been swept clear of clouds, and stars sparkled in the pure
depths of the night. They were white, with the exception of one that
burned with an unsteady yellow ray and seemed close by. This, John
Woolfolk thought, was strange. He concentrated a frowning gaze upon
it--perhaps in falling into the so