distorted by the terrors of an evil conscience. Even her words when
she spoke again jarred on him.

"You knew the voice?" she whispered.

"I did not know it," he answered brokenly. "I knew--whose it was."

"Mine?"

"Yes." He scarcely breathed the word.

She did not cry "Hush!" this time, but she caught her breath; and after
a moment's pause, "Still--you did not recognise it?" she murmured. "You
did not know that it was my voice?" Could it be that after all she hoped
to blind him?

"I did not."

"Thank God!"

"Thank God?" He stared at her, echoing the words in his astonishment.
How dared she name the sacred name?

She read his thoughts. "Yes," she said hardily, "why not?"

He turned on her. "Why not?" he cried. "Why not? You dare to thank Him,
who last night denied Him? You dare to name His name in the light, who
in the darkness----You! And you are not afraid?"

"Afraid?" she repeated. There was a strange light, almost a smile he
would have deemed it had he thought that possible, in her face, "Nay,
perhaps; perhaps. For even the devils, we are told, believe and
tremble."

His jaw fell; for a moment he gazed at her in sheer bewilderment. Then,
as the full import of her words and her look overwhelmed him, he turned
to the wall and bowed his face on his arms. His whole being shook, his
soul was sick. What was he to say to her? What was he to do? Flee from
her presence as from the presence of Antichrist? Avoid her henceforth as
he valued his soul? Pluck even the memory of her from his mind? Or
wrestle with her, argue with her, snatch her from the foul spells and
enchantments that now held her, the tool and chosen instrument of the
evil one, in their fiendish grip?

He felt a Churchman's horror--Protestant as he was--at the thought of a
woman possessed. But for that reason, and because he was in the way of
becoming a minister, was it not his duty to measure his strength with
the Adversary? Alas! he could conceive of no words, no thoughts, no
arguments adequate to that strife. Had he been a Papist he might have
turned with hope, even with pious confidence, to the Holy Stoup, the
Bell and Book and Candle, to the Relics, and hundred Exorcisms of his
Church. But the colder and more abstract faith of Calvin, while it
admitted the possibility of such possessions, supplied no weapons of a
material kind.

He groaned in his impotence, stifled by the unwholesome atmosphere of
his thoughts. He dared not even ponder to