ff again.'

"What Mr. Holly meant by this 'command' I do not know, for he would
speak no more of the matter.

"I pass on to the last scene. One night about eleven o'clock, knowing
that my patient's end was near, I went up to see him, proposing to
inject some strychnine to keep the heart going a little longer. Before
I reached the house I met the caretaker coming to seek me in a great
fright, and asked her if her master was dead. She answered No; but he
was _gone_--had got out of bed and, just as he was, barefooted, left
the house, and was last seen by her grandson among the very Scotch firs
where we were talking. The lad, who was terrified out of his wits, for
he thought that he beheld a ghost, had told her so.

"The moonlight was very brilliant that night, especially as fresh snow
had fallen, which reflected its rays. I was on foot, and began to search
among the firs, till presently just outside of them I found the track of
naked feet in the snow. Of course I followed, calling to the housekeeper
to go and wake her husband, for no one else lives near by. The spoor
proved very easy to trace across the clean sheet of snow. It ran up the
slope of a hill behind the house.

"Now, on the crest of this hill is an ancient monument of upright
monoliths set there by some primeval people, known locally as the
Devil's Ring--a sort of miniature Stonehenge in fact. I had seen it
several times, and happened to have been present not long ago at a
meeting of an archaeological society when its origin and purpose were
discussed. I remember that one learned but somewhat eccentric gentleman
read a short paper upon a rude, hooded bust and head that are cut within
the chamber of a tall, flat-topped cromlech, or dolmen, which stands
alone in the centre of the ring.

"He said that it was a representation of the Egyptian goddess, Isis, and
that this place had once been sacred to some form of her worship, or at
any rate to that of a Nature goddess with like attributes, a suggestion
which the other learned gentlemen treated as absurd. They declared that
Isis had never travelled into Britain, though for my part I do not see
why the Phoenicians, or even the Romans, who adopted her cult, more
or less, should not have brought it here. But I know nothing of such
matters and will not discuss them.

"I remembered also that Mr. Holly was acquainted with this place, for
he had mentioned it to me on the previous day, asking if the stones were
still u