lector came round before the train started, Hamar
waited, till every one else in the compartment had shown him their
tickets, and then, just as the man was about to demand his, swallowed
one of the prescribed pills, repeating immediately, in a loud voice,
which caused considerable excitement among the other passengers, the
words, "Bakra--naka--taksomana!" The next moment he had disappeared.

"Strike me red!" the collector gasped, putting one hand to his heart,
and grasping the door with the other. "What's become of him? Was
he--a--a--gho--st?"

"I don't--er--know--er what to--to make of it," the parson said,
heroically preserving his Oxford drawl, in spite of his chattering
teeth. "I don't--er, of course--er, believe in gho--sts! He must--er
have been--a--a--an evil spirit. Dear me--aw!"

"Help me out of the carriage at once," the lady with the stare panted.
"I consider the whole thing most disgraceful. I shall report it to the
Company."

"What's the matter, Joe?" an inspector called out, threading his way
through the crowd of people, that had commenced to collect at the door
of the compartment.

"I'm blessed if I know!" the collector said. "The honly explanation I
can give is that a gent who was seated here has dissolved--the hot
weather has melted him like butter!"

At this there was a shout of laughter, the inspector slammed the door,
the guard whistled, and the next moment the train was off.

As soon as the train was well out of the station Hamar repeated the
words he had used, backwards, and he was once again visible.

The effect of his reappearance amongst them was even more striking
than that of his previous disappearance.

"Take it away--take it away!" the lady opposite him shouted, throwing
up her hands to ward him off. "It's there again! Take it away! I shall
die--I shall go mad!"

"How hideous! How diabolical!" a stout, elderly man said in slow,
measured tones, as if he were reading his own funeral service. "It
must be the devil! The devil! Ha!" and burying his face in his hands,
he indulged in a loud fit of mirthless laughter.

"Why don't you do something? Talk theology to it, exorcise it," a
remarkably plain woman, in the far corner of the carriage said, in
highly indignant tones to the clergyman. "As usual, whenever there is
something to be done, it is woman who must do it!"

She got up, and casting a look of infinite scorn at the
clergyman--whose condition of terror prevented him uttering e