had seemed to
see light withdrawn from the lamps. I mastered a tremor of the nerves,
and covered it by stroking Bagheera, who sat on a hall chair making an
after-dinner toilet with tongue and paw.

"Well, take care of Phil," I repeated, evading argument.

He detained me.

"The young lady might not come if there were two people, Mr. Locke. I
can see that! But I'll go instead. I guess I'd be safer than you, with
the--the----You know what I mean! It would be the first time for me. And
if I sat waiting in the dark, the lady couldn't tell you were not there.
Of course I'd bring her right to you."

No one could appreciate the courage of that offer so well as we who had
both felt the intolerable horror of the nearness of the Thing whose
nature was beyond our nature to endure.

"She would come to no one except me," I refused. "But, thank you. And
Vere, if what you have said about my feeling toward Phillida's husband
was true once, it is true no longer."

His clasp was still warm on my hand when I went into my room and
switched on the lights. Soft and colorful, the haunted room sprang into
view. The writing-table and piano gleamed bare without their usual
burdens of scattered papers and music, removed that afternoon. For lack
of familiar occupation, when I sat down in my favorite place, I took up
the gold pomander and fell to studying the intricate designs worked in
the metal.

"_Containing a rare herb of Jerusalem called Lady's Rose, resembling
spikenard, with vervain, and cedar, and secret simples----_"

"_Vervain, which is powerful against evil spirits----_"

The strange fragrance, heady as the bouquet of rich wine, never cloying,
exquisite, might well have seemed magical to the dry Puritans, I mused.
It should stay by me tonight, like a promise of her coming.

After I had sat there a while, I turned out the lights.

CHAPTER XVIII

"An excellent way to get a fayrie--and when you have her, bind
her!"--ANCIENT ALCHEMIST'S RECIPE.

In the darkness Time crept along like a crippled thing, slow-moving,
hideous. Outside fell the monotonous drip, drip from trees and bushes,
likened by Phillida to a horrid clock. The fog was a sounding-board for
furtive noises that grew up like fungi in the moist atmosphere. The
thought of Phillida and Vere down in the pleasant living room tempted me
almost beyond resistance. I wanted to spring up, to rush out of the
room; to fling myself into my car and drive full s