d sat down in the next stall. Bubbles was leaning
back more comfortably now, her red cap almost off her head. There was a
great look of restfulness on her pale, sensitive face.

She put out her hand and felt for his; after a moment of hesitation he
slid down and knelt close to her.

"Bubbles," he whispered, "my darling--darling Bubbles. I wish that here
and now you would make up your mind to give up everything--" He stopped
speaking, and bending, kissed her hand.

"Yes," she said dreamily. "Give up everything, Bill? Perhaps I will. But
what do you mean by everything?"

There was a self-pitying note in her low, vibrant voice. "You know it is
given to people, sometimes, to choose between good and evil. I'm
afraid"--she leant forward, and passed her right hand, with a touch of
tenderness most unusual with her, over his upturned face and curly
hair--"I'm afraid, Bill, that, almost without knowing it, I chose evil,
'Evil, be thou my good.' Isn't that what the wicked old Satanists used
to say?"

"Don't you say it too!" he exclaimed, sharply distressed.

"I know I acted stupidly--in fact, as we're in a church I don't mind
saying I acted very wrongly last night."

Bubbles spoke in a serious tone--more seriously, indeed, than she had
ever yet spoken to her faithful, long-suffering friend. "But a great
deal of what happens to me and round me, Bill, I can't help--I wish I
could," she said slowly.

"I don't quite understand." There was a painful choking feeling in his
throat. "Try and tell me what you mean, Bubbles."

"What I mean is clear enough"--she now spoke with a touch of impatience.
"I mean that wherever I am, _They_ come too, and gather about me. It
wasn't my fault that that horrible Thing appeared to Pegler as soon as I
entered the house."

"But why should you think the ghost Pegler saw--if she did see it--had
anything to do with you? Wyndfell Hall has been haunted for over a
hundred years--so the village people say."

"Pegler saw nothing till I came. And though I struggle against the
belief, and though I very seldom admit it, even to myself, I know quite
well, Bill, that I'm never really alone--never free of Them
unless--unless, Bill, I'm in a holy place, when they don't dare to
come."

There was a tone of fear, of awful dread, in her voice. In spite of
himself he felt impressed.

"But why should they come specially round _you_?" he asked uneasily.

"You know as well as I do that I'm a strong medium. But