I said firmly, 'You are coming with me. You
can't stay in this infernal hole, like a rat in a trap.'

"Margot gave a weary little sigh and leaned closer to me, giving herself
into my care as trustfully as a child. Until that time she had been just
a figure in the great war game that might provide me with something to
'write up' into a book. That had been my principal thought. Now, all in
a few moments, her beauty, the frightened look which had shone in her
great grey eyes, her distress made me forget all that, drove all
thoughts of traffic with publishers from my mind. I knew only that it
was good to help her.

"Then I set about thinking how I could get Margot and Albertus Magnus to
England. It was going to be a difficult game. I went carefully over all
the good fellows I knew who could help me. There was old Longden of the
A.S.C. depot at St. Omer, there was Captain Chester, the transport
officer at Boulogne, and Orgles of ammunition supply at Cassel, which is
a small place where the strings of motors from the base unload.

"Well, (to get on,) we arrived late that night at St. Omer, and by a
vast amount of bribery and cajolery I got some A.S.C. men to knock up a
strong case for the Albertus Magnus and--but enough. It is sufficient to
say that an officer who was going home on leave was kind enough to see
Margot as far as Boulogne, and in the fullness of time both Albertus
Magnus and the girl came safely to England.

"I have endeavoured to give you the facts of my strange story up to this
point, without omission or exaggeration. I have been careful not to miss
out the slightest items. If I have failed, it must not be put down to
forgetfulness: for I do not think there is a single thing about old
Ombos that has not been permanently fixed in my mind. Even now I have
but to shut my eyes to see the leering face of Albertus, to stand once
more trembling with terror and see that green shadow jump into the dusk
with hellish glee and frolicsome skippings and toppings gallop away, to
walk into the old library at home and see poor Price with his knees
drawn up and eyes fixed open in extreme terror--But enough. I do not
exaggerate.

"And now I must come to what you'll call the second part of the
story--though it was all one long connected nightmare to me. I returned
from France, as you know, six months ago, with a bullet in my leg, and
thought myself in the best of luck to get a 'blighty' one; I mean a
slight wound which nece