What was it those fingers sought, what
mysterious treasures, what jewels hidden in the under-layer of his
consciousness? His brain was like a human gold-mine, quaking under the
blow of the pick and the tread of the miner. The miner! Ah, the miner! Ceaselessly, thoroughly, relentlessly, he opened vein after vein and
wrested untold riches from the quivering ground; but each vein was a
live vein and each nugget of gold a thought! No wonder the boy was a nervous wreck. Whenever a tremulous nascent idea
was formulating itself, the dream-hand clutched it and took it away,
brutally severing the fine threads that bind thought to thought. And
when the morning came, how his head ached! It was not an acute pain, but
dull, heavy, incessant. These sensations, Ernest frequently told himself, were morbid fancies. But then, the monomaniac who imagines that his arms have been mangled or
cut from his body, might as well be without arms. Mind can annihilate
obstacles. It can also create them. Psychology was no unfamiliar ground
to Ernest, and it was not difficult for him to seek in some casual
suggestion an explanation for his delusion, the fixed notion that
haunted him day and night. But he also realized that to explain a
phenomenon is not to explain it away. The man who analyses his emotions
cannot wholly escape them, and the shadow of fear--primal, inexplicable
fear--may darken at moments of weakness the life of the subtlest
psychologist and the clearest thinker. He had never spoken to Reginald of his terrible nightmares. Coming on
the heel of the fancy that he, Ernest, had written "The Princess With
the Yellow Veil," a fancy that, by the way, had again possessed him of
late, this new delusion would certainly arouse suspicion as to his
sanity in Reginald's mind. He would probably send him to a sanitarium;
he certainly would not keep him in the house. Beneficence itself in all
other things, his host was not to be trifled with in any matter that
interfered with his work. He would act swiftly and without mercy. For the first time in many days Ernest thought of Abel Felton. Poor boy! What had become of him after he had been turned from the house? He would
not wait for any one to tell him to pack his bundle. But then, that was
impossible; Reginald was fond of him. Suddenly Ernest's meditations were interrupted by a noise at the outer
door. A key was turned in the lock. It must be he--but why so soon? What
could have brought him back at this hour? He opened the door and went
out into the hall to see what had happened. The figure that he beheld
was certainly not the person expected, but a woman, from whose shoulders
a theatre-cloak fell in graceful folds,--probably a visitor for
Reginald. Ernest was about to withdraw discreetly, when the electric
light that was burning in the hallway fell upon her face and illumined
it. Then indeed surprise overcame him. "Ethel," he cried, "is it you?" XXIII


Ernest conducted Ethel Brandenbourg to his room and helped her to remove
her cloak. While he was placing the garment upon the back of a chair, she slipped a
little key into her hand-bag. He looked at her with a question in his
eyes. "Yes," she replied, "I kept the key; but I had not dreamed that I would
ever again cross this threshold." Meanwhile it had grown quite dark. The reflection of the street lanterns
without dimly lit the room, and through the twilight fantastic shadows
seemed to dance. The perfume of her hair pervaded the room and filled the boy's heart
with romance. Tenderness long suppressed called with a thousand voices. The hour, the strangeness and unexpectedness of her visit, perhaps even
a boy's pardonable vanity, roused passion from its slumbers and once
again wrought in Ernest's soul the miracle of love. His arm encircled
her neck and his lips stammered blind, sweet, crazy and caressing
things. "Turn on the light," she pleaded. "You were not always so cruel." "No matter, I have not come to speak of love." "Why, then, have you come?" Ernest felt a little awkward, disappointed, as he uttered these words. What could have induced her to come to his rooms? He loosened his hold
on her and did as she asked. How pale she looked in the light, how beautiful! Surely, she had
sorrowed for him; but why had she not answered his letter? Yes, why? "Your letter?" She smiled a little sadly. "Surely you did not expect me
to answer that?" "Why not?" He had again approached her and his lips were close to hers. "Why not? I have yearned for you. I love you." His breath intoxicated her; it was like a subtle perfume. Still she did
not yield. "You love me now--you did not love me then. The music of your words was
cold--machine-made, strained and superficial. I shall not answer, I told
myself: in his heart he has forgotten you. I did not then realise that a
dangerous force had possessed your life and crushed in your mind every
image but its own." "I don't understand." "Do you think I would have come here if it were a light matter? No, I
tell you, it is a matter of life and death to you, at least as an
artist." "What do you mean by that?" "Have you done a stroke of work since I last saw you?" "Yes, let me see, surely, magazine articles and a poem." "That is not what I want to know. Have you accomplished anything big? Have you grown since this summer? How about your novel?" "I--I have almost finished it in my mind, but I have found no chance to
begin with the actual writing. I was sick of late, very sick." No doubt of it! His face was pinched and pale, and the lines about the
mouth were curiously contorted, like those of a man suffering from a
painful internal disease. "Tell me," she ventured, "do you ever miss anything?" "Do you mean--are there thieves?" "Thieves! Against thieves one can protect oneself." He stared at her wildly, half-frightened, in anticipation of some
dreadful revelation. His dream! His dream! That hand! Could it be more
than a dream? God! His lips quivered. Ethel observed his agitation and continued more quietly, but with the
same insistence: "Have you ever had ideas, plans that you began without
having strength to complete them? Have you had glimpses of vocal visions
that seemed to vanish no sooner than seen? Did it ever seem to you as if
some mysterious and superior will brutally interfered with the workings
of your brain?" Did it seem so to him! He himself could not have stated more plainly
the experience of the last few months. Each word fell from her lips like
the blow of a hammer. Shivering, he put his arm around her, seeking
solace, not love. This time she did not repulse him and, trustingly, as
a child confides to his mother, he depicted to her the suffering that
harrowed his life and made it a hell. As she listened, indignation clouded her forehead, while rising tears of
anger and of love weighed down her lashes. She could bear the pitiful
sight no longer. "Child," she cried, "do you know who your tormentor is?" And like a flash the truth passed from her to him.