I burn up my past! thus did I
sacrifice grandly and gladly the ill spirit my wild desires had evoked!
Thus--thus! All the base of the Manse was red-hot, when, on a sudden, I
heard a great shout that seemed to come from the sky. Light sprang in an
upper window. There followed a sound like the smash of glass, and I saw
two arms shoot out, the top part of a figure and a face framed in the
glare. I deemed it the vision of the poor spectre that I destroyed. I
looked upon it and fancied I could detect the tortured lineaments of the
doctor, his accustomed gestures distorted by fear and fury. But then I
seemed to see behind him another figure, struggling, and to hear the
failing scream of a woman. But the flames from below leaped to the roof.
The floors fell in with an uproar. The figure, or figures, disappeared.

Trembling I turned to go, my mind shuddering at the thought of the
apparition I had seen. I got into the lane and hastened towards home.
Soon the burning Manse was out of sight, and I was swallowed up in the
intense darkness.

Now, as I went along, a terrible and very peculiar sensation came upon
me. I heard no footsteps; all was silence. Yet I seemed to be aware that
I was closely companioned, that at my very side something--I knew not
what--walked, keeping pace with me. And so close did I believe this
thing to be, that at moments I even felt it pressing against me like a
slim figure in the night. Once, when it thus nestled to me, as if in
affection, I could not refrain from crying out aloud. I stretched forth
my arms to grasp this surely amorous horror of the darkness, but found
nothing, and pursued my road in a sweat of apprehension. And still, the
thing was certainly with me, and seemed, I thought, to praise me as I
walked, as the good man is praised on his journey. My great horror was
that this creature that I could not see, could not hear, could not feel,
and yet was so sharply conscious of, was _well disposed towards me_. My
heart craved its hatred--but it loved me I knew. My soul demanded its
curses. I almost heard it bless me as I moved. My knees knocked
together, my limbs were turned to wax, as it was borne in upon me that I
had surely done this terror that walked in darkness a service of some
kind. To be pursued in fury by one of the dreadful beings that dwell in
the borderland beyond our sight is sad and dreary; but to be followed
thus by one as by a dog, to be fawned upon and caressed--this is
appalling.