She'd have got me for good--she'd
have been I, and I'd have been she--for ever--too late--My body'd have
been hers for good--She'd have been a man, and fully human, just as she
wanted to be--I suppose she'd have put me out of the way--killed her
own ex-body with me in it, damn her, _just as she did before_--just as
she, he, or it did before----"

Edward's face was now atrociously distorted, and he bent it
uncomfortably close to mine as his voice fell to a whisper. "You must know what I hinted in the car--_that she isn't Asenath at
all, but really old Ephraim himself_. I suspected it a year and a half
ago, and I know it now. Her handwriting shows it when she goes off
guard--sometimes she jots down a note in writing that's just like her
father's manuscripts, stroke for stroke--and sometimes she says things
that nobody but an old man like Ephraim could say. He changed forms
with her when he felt death coming--she was the only one he could find
with the right kind of brain and a weak enough will--he got her body
permanently, just as she almost got mine, and then poisoned the old
body he'd put her into. Haven't you seen old Ephraim's soul glaring out
of that she-devil's eyes dozens of times--and out of mine when she has
control of my body?" The whisperer was panting, and paused for breath. I said nothing, and
when he resumed, his voice was nearer normal. This, I reflected, was
a case for the asylum, but I would not be the one to send him there. Perhaps time and freedom from Asenath would do its work. I could see
that he would never wish to dabble in morbid occultism again. "I'll tell you more later--I must have a long rest now. I'll tell you
something of the forbidden horrors she led me into--something of the
age-old horrors that even now are festering in out-of-the-way corners
with a few monstrous priests to keep them alive. Some people know
things about the universe that nobody ought to know, and can do things
that nobody ought to be able to do. I've been in it up to my neck, but
that's the end. Today I'd burn that damned _Necronomicon_ and all the
rest if I were librarian at Miskatonic. "But she can't get me now. I must get out of that accursed house as
soon as I can, and settle down at home. You'll help me, I know, if I
need help. Those devilish servants, you know--and if people should
get too inquisitive about Asenath. You see, I can't give them her
address.... Then there are certain groups of searchers--certain cults,
you know--that might misunderstand our breaking up ... some of them
have damnably curious ideas and methods. I know you'll stand by me if
anything happens--even if I have to tell you a lot that will shock
you...."

       *       *       *       *       *

I had Edward stay and sleep in one of the guest-chambers that night,
and in the morning he seemed calmer. We discussed certain possible
arrangements for his moving back into the Derby mansion, and I hoped he
would lose no time in making the change. He did not call the next evening, but I saw him frequently during
the ensuing weeks. We talked as little as possible about strange and
unpleasant things, but discussed the renovation of the old Derby house,
and the travels which Edward promised to take with my son and me the
following summer. Of Asenath we said almost nothing, for I saw that the subject was a
peculiarly disturbing one. Gossip, of course, was rife; but that was no
novelty in connection with the strange menage at the old Crowninshield
house. One thing I did not like was what Derby's banker let fall in an
over-expansive mood at the Miskatonic Club--about the checks Edward was
sending regularly to a Moses and Abigail Sargent and a Eunice Babson in
Innsmouth. That looked as if those evil-faced servants were extorting
some kind of tribute from him--yet he had not mentioned the matter to
me. I wished that the summer--and my son's Harvard vacation--would come,
so that we could get Edward to Europe. He was not, I soon saw, mending
as rapidly as I had hoped he would; for there was something a bit
hysterical in his occasional exhilaration, while his moods of fright
and depression were altogether too frequent. The old Derby house was
ready by December, yet Edward constantly put off moving. Though he
hated and seemed to fear the Crowninshield place, he was at the same
time queerly enslaved by it. He could not seem to begin dismantling
things, and invented every kind of excuse to postpone action. When
I pointed this out to him he appeared unaccountably frightened. His father's old butler--who was there with other re-acquired
servants--told me one day that Edward's occasional prowlings about the
house, and especially down cellar, looked odd and unwholesome to him. I
wondered if Asenath had been writing disturbing letters, but the butler
said there was no mail which could have come from her. It was about Christmas that Derby broke down one evening while calling
on me. I was steering the conversation toward next summer's travels
when he suddenly shrieked and leaped up from his chair with a look of
shocking, uncontrollable fright--a cosmic panic and loathing such as
only the nether gulfs of nightmare could bring to any sane mind. "My brain! My brain! God, Dan--it's tugging--from
beyond--knocking--clawing--that she-devil--even now--Ephraim--Kamog! Kamog!--The pit of the shoggoths--Iä! Shub-Niggurath! The Goat with a
Thousand Young!... "The flame--the flame--beyond body, beyond life--in the earth--oh,
God!..." I pulled him back to his chair and poured some wine down his throat
as his frenzy sank to a dull apathy. He did not resist, but kept his
lips moving as if talking to himself. Presently I realized that he was
trying to talk to me, and bent my ear to his mouth to catch the feeble
words.

" ----again, again--she's trying--I might have known--nothing can stop
that force; not distance, nor magic, nor death--it comes and comes,
mostly in the night--I can't leave--it's horrible--oh, God, Dan, _if
you only knew as I do just how horrible it is_!..." When he had slumped down into a stupor I propped him with pillows and
let normal sleep overtake him. I did not call a doctor, for I knew what
would be said of his sanity, and wished to give nature a chance if I
possibly could. He waked at midnight, and I put him to bed upstairs,
but he was gone by morning. He had let himself quietly out of the
house--and his butler, when called on the wire, said he was at home
pacing restlessly about the library. 6


Edward went to pieces rapidly after that. He did not call again, but
I went daily to see him. He would always be sitting in his library,
staring at nothing and having an air of abnormal _listening_. Sometimes
he talked rationally, but always on trivial topics. Any mention of his
trouble, of future plans, or of Asenath would send him into a frenzy. His butler said he had frightful seizures at night, during which he
might eventually do himself harm.