so
long. Puzzle my thick head. Make my flesh creep. Come on. A good long
story. All blood and crimes."

Had she accidentally hit on the right suggestion to strike his wayward
fancy? I knew his high opinion of his own skill in "dramatic narrative."
I knew that one of his favorite amusements was to puzzle Ariel by
telling her stories that she could not understand. Would he wander away
into the regions of wild romance? Or would he remember that my obstinacy
still threatened him with reopening the inquiry into the tragedy at
Gleninch? and would he set his cunning at work to mislead me by some new
stratagem? This latter course was the course which my past experience of
him suggested that he would take. But, to my surprise and alarm, I found
my past experience at fault. Ariel succeeded in diverting his mind from
the subject which had been in full possession of it the moment before
she spoke! He showed his face again. It was overspread by a broad smile
of gratified self-esteem. He was weak enough now to let even Ariel find
her way to his vanity. I saw it with a sense of misgiving, with a doubt
whether I had not delayed my visit until too late, which turned me cold
from head to foot.

Miserrimus Dexter spoke--to Ariel, not to me.

"Poor devil!" he said, patting her head complacently. "You don't
understand a word of my stories, do you? And yet I can make the flesh
creep on your great clumsy body--and yet I can hold your muddled mind,
and make you like it. Poor devil!" He leaned back serenely in his chair,
and looked my way again. Would the sight of me remind him of the
words that had passed between us not a minute since? No! There was the
pleasantly tickled self-conceit smiling at me exactly as it had smiled
at Ariel. "I excel in dramatic narrative, Mrs. Valeria," he said. "And
this creature here on the stool is a remarkable proof of it. She is
quite a psychological study when I tell her one of my stories. It is
really amusing to see the half-witted wretch's desperate efforts to
understand me. You shall have a specimen. I have been out of spirits
while you were away--I haven't told her a story for weeks past; I will
tell her one now. Don't suppose it's any effort to me! My invention is
inexhaustible. You are sure to be amused--you are naturally serious--but
you are sure to be amused. I am naturally serious too; and I always
laugh at her."

Ariel clapped her great shapeless hands. "He always laughs at me!" she
said, with a