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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Lair of the White Worm, by Bram Stoker
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Lair of the White Worm
+
+
+Author: Bram Stoker
+
+Release Date: March 27, 2005  [eBook #1188]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM***
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcribed form the 1911 W. Foulsham & Co. Ltd. edition by David Price,
+email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
+
+
+
+
+
+THE LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM
+
+
+To my friend Bertha Nicoll with affectionate esteem.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I--ADAM SALTON ARRIVES
+
+
+Adam Salton sauntered into the Empire Club, Sydney, and found awaiting
+him a letter from his grand-uncle.  He had first heard from the old
+gentleman less than a year before, when Richard Salton had claimed
+kinship, stating that he had been unable to write earlier, as he had
+found it very difficult to trace his grand-nephew's address.  Adam was
+delighted and replied cordially; he had often heard his father speak of
+the older branch of the family with whom his people had long lost touch.
+Some interesting correspondence had ensued.  Adam eagerly opened the
+letter which had only just arrived, and conveyed a cordial invitation to
+stop with his grand-uncle at Lesser Hill, for as long a time as he could
+spare.
+
+"Indeed," Richard Salton went on, "I am in hopes that you will make your
+permanent home here.  You see, my dear boy, you and I are all that remain
+of our race, and it is but fitting that you should succeed me when the
+time comes.  In this year of grace, 1860, I am close on eighty years of
+age, and though we have been a long-lived race, the span of life cannot
+be prolonged beyond reasonable bounds.  I am prepared to like you, and to
+make your home with me as happy as you could wish.  So do come at once on
+receipt of this, and find the welcome I am waiting to give you.  I send,
+in case such may make matters easy for you, a banker's draft for 200
+pounds.  Come soon, so that we may both of us enjoy many happy days
+together.  If you are able to give me the pleasure of seeing you, send me
+as soon as you can a letter telling me when to expect you.  Then when you
+arrive at Plymouth or Southampton or whatever port you are bound for,
+wait on board, and I will meet you at the earliest hour possible."
+
+* * * * *
+
+Old Mr. Salton was delighted when Adam's reply arrived and sent a groom
+hot-foot to his crony, Sir Nathaniel de Salis, to inform him that his
+grand-nephew was due at Southampton on the twelfth of June.
+
+Mr. Salton gave instructions to have ready a carriage early on the
+important day, to start for Stafford, where he would catch the 11.40 a.m.
+train.  He would stay that night with his grand-nephew, either on the
+ship, which would be a new experience for him, or, if his guest should
+prefer it, at a hotel.  In either case they would start in the early
+morning for home.  He had given instructions to his bailiff to send the
+postillion carriage on to Southampton, to be ready for their journey
+home, and to arrange for relays of his own horses to be sent on at once.
+He intended that his grand-nephew, who had been all his life in
+Australia, should see something of rural England on the drive.  He had
+plenty of young horses of his own breeding and breaking, and could depend
+on a journey memorable to the young man.  The luggage would be sent on by
+rail to Stafford, where one of his carts would meet it.  Mr. Salton,
+during the journey to Southampton, often wondered if his grand-nephew was
+as much excited as he was at the idea of meeting so near a relation for
+the first time; and it was with an effort that he controlled himself.  The
+endless railway lines and switches round the Southampton Docks fired his
+anxiety afresh.
+
+As the train drew up on the dockside, he was getting his hand traps
+together, when the carriage door was wrenched open and a young man jumped
+in.
+
+"How are you, uncle?  I recognised you from the photo you sent me!  I
+wanted to meet you as soon as I could, but everything is so strange to me
+that I didn't quite know what to do.  However, here I am.  I am glad to
+see you, sir.  I have been dreaming of this happiness for thousands of
+miles; now I find that the reality beats all the dreaming!"  As he spoke
+the old man and the young one were heartily wringing each other's hands.
+
+The meeting so auspiciously begun proceeded well.  Adam, seeing that the
+old man was interested in the novelty of the ship, suggested that he
+should stay the night on board, and that he would himself be ready to
+start at any hour and go anywhere that the other suggested.  This
+affectionate willingness to fall in with his own plans quite won the old
+man's heart.  He warmly accepted the invitation, and at once they became
+not only on terms of affectionate relationship, but almost like old
+friends.  The heart of the old man, which had been empty for so long,
+found a new delight.  The young man found, on landing in the old country,
+a welcome and a surrounding in full harmony with all his dreams
+throughout his wanderings and solitude, and the promise of a fresh and
+adventurous life.  It was not long before the old man accepted him to
+full relationship by calling him by his Christian name.  After a long
+talk on affairs of interest, they retired to the cabin, which the elder
+was to share.  Richard Salton put his hands affectionately on the boy's
+shoulders--though Adam was in his twenty-seventh year, he was a boy, and
+always would be, to his grand-uncle.
+
+"I am so glad to find you as you are, my dear boy--just such a young man
+as I had always hoped for as a son, in the days when I still had such
+hopes.  However, that is all past.  But thank God there is a new life to
+begin for both of us.  To you must be the larger part--but there is still
+time for some of it to be shared in common.  I have waited till we should
+have seen each other to enter upon the subject; for I thought it better
+not to tie up your young life to my old one till we should have
+sufficient personal knowledge to justify such a venture.  Now I can, so
+far as I am concerned, enter into it freely, since from the moment my
+eyes rested on you I saw my son--as he shall be, God willing--if he
+chooses such a course himself."
+
+"Indeed I do, sir--with all my heart!"
+
+"Thank you, Adam, for that."  The old, man's eyes filled and his voice
+trembled.  Then, after a long silence between them, he went on: "When I
+heard you were coming I made my will.  It was well that your interests
+should be protected from that moment on.  Here is the deed--keep it,
+Adam.  All I have shall belong to you; and if love and good wishes, or
+the memory of them, can make life sweeter, yours shall be a happy one.
+Now, my dear boy, let us turn in.  We start early in the morning and have
+a long drive before us.  I hope you don't mind driving?  I was going to
+have the old travelling carriage in which my grandfather, your
+great-grand-uncle, went to Court when William IV. was king.  It is all
+right--they built well in those days--and it has been kept in perfect
+order.  But I think I have done better: I have sent the carriage in which
+I travel myself.  The horses are of my own breeding, and relays of them
+shall take us all the way.  I hope you like horses?  They have long been
+one of my greatest interests in life."
+
+"I love them, sir, and I am happy to say I have many of my own.  My
+father gave me a horse farm for myself when I was eighteen.  I devoted
+myself to it, and it has gone on.  Before I came away, my steward gave me
+a memorandum that we have in my own place more than a thousand, nearly
+all good."
+
+"I am glad, my boy.  Another link between us."
+
+"Just fancy what a delight it will be, sir, to see so much of England--and
+with you!"
+
+"Thank you again, my boy.  I will tell you all about your future home and
+its surroundings as we go.  We shall travel in old-fashioned state, I
+tell you.  My grandfather always drove four-in-hand; and so shall we."
+
+"Oh, thanks, sir, thanks.  May I take the ribbons sometimes?"
+
+"Whenever you choose, Adam.  The team is your own.  Every horse we use to-
+day is to be your own."
+
+"You are too generous, uncle!"
+
+"Not at all.  Only an old man's selfish pleasure.  It is not every day
+that an heir to the old home comes back.  And--oh, by the way . . . No,
+we had better turn in now--I shall tell you the rest in the morning."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II--THE CASWALLS OF CASTRA REGIS
+
+
+Mr. Salton had all his life been an early riser, and necessarily an early
+waker.  But early as he woke on the next morning--and although there was
+an excuse for not prolonging sleep in the constant whirr and rattle of
+the "donkey" engine winches of the great ship--he met the eyes of Adam
+fixed on him from his berth.  His grand-nephew had given him the sofa,
+occupying the lower berth himself.  The old man, despite his great
+strength and normal activity, was somewhat tired by his long journey of
+the day before, and the prolonged and exciting interview which followed
+it.  So he was glad to lie still and rest his body, whilst his mind was
+actively exercised in taking in all he could of his strange surroundings.
+Adam, too, after the pastoral habit to which he had been bred, woke with
+the dawn, and was ready to enter on the experiences of the new day
+whenever it might suit his elder companion.  It was little wonder, then,
+that, so soon as each realised the other's readiness, they simultaneously
+jumped up and began to dress.  The steward had by previous instructions
+early breakfast prepared, and it was not long before they went down the
+gangway on shore in search of the carriage.
+
+They found Mr. Salton's bailiff looking out for them on the dock, and he
+brought them at once to where the carriage was waiting in the street.
+Richard Salton pointed out with pride to his young companion the
+suitability of the vehicle for every need of travel.  To it were
+harnessed four useful horses, with a postillion to each pair.
+
+"See," said the old man proudly, "how it has all the luxuries of useful
+travel--silence and isolation as well as speed.  There is nothing to
+obstruct the view of those travelling and no one to overhear what they
+may say.  I have used that trap for a quarter of a century, and I never
+saw one more suitable for travel.  You shall test it shortly.  We are
+going to drive through the heart of England; and as we go I'll tell you
+what I was speaking of last night.  Our route is to be by Salisbury,
+Bath, Bristol, Cheltenham, Worcester, Stafford; and so home."
+
+Adam remained silent a few minutes, during which he seemed all eyes, for
+he perpetually ranged the whole circle of the horizon.
+
+"Has our journey to-day, sir," he asked, "any special relation to what
+you said last night that you wanted to tell me?"
+
+"Not directly; but indirectly, everything."
+
+"Won't you tell me now--I see we cannot be overheard--and if anything
+strikes you as we go along, just run it in.  I shall understand."
+
+So old Salton spoke:
+
+"To begin at the beginning, Adam.  That lecture of yours on 'The Romans
+in Britain,' a report of which you posted to me, set me thinking--in
+addition to telling me your tastes.  I wrote to you at once and asked you
+to come home, for it struck me that if you were fond of historical
+research--as seemed a fact--this was exactly the place for you, in
+addition to its being the home of your own forbears.  If you could learn
+so much of the British Romans so far away in New South Wales, where there
+cannot be even a tradition of them, what might you not make of the same
+amount of study on the very spot.  Where we are going is in the real
+heart of the old kingdom of Mercia, where there are traces of all the
+various nationalities which made up the conglomerate which became
+Britain."
+
+"I rather gathered that you had some more definite--more personal reason
+for my hurrying.  After all, history can keep--except in the making!"
+
+"Quite right, my boy.  I had a reason such as you very wisely guessed.  I
+was anxious for you to be here when a rather important phase of our local
+history occurred."
+
+"What is that, if I may ask, sir?"
+
+"Certainly.  The principal landowner of our part of the county is on his
+way home, and there will be a great home-coming, which you may care to
+see.  The fact is, for more than a century the various owners in the
+succession here, with the exception of a short time, have lived abroad."
+
+"How is that, sir, if I may ask?"
+
+"The great house and estate in our part of the world is Castra Regis, the
+family seat of the Caswall family.  The last owner who lived here was
+Edgar Caswall, grandfather of the man who is coming here--and he was the
+only one who stayed even a short time.  This man's grandfather, also
+named Edgar--they keep the tradition of the family Christian
+name--quarrelled with his family and went to live abroad, not keeping up
+any intercourse, good or bad, with his relatives, although this
+particular Edgar, as I told you, did visit his family estate, yet his son
+was born and lived and died abroad, while his grandson, the latest
+inheritor, was also born and lived abroad till he was over thirty--his
+present age.  This was the second line of absentees.  The great estate of
+Castra Regis has had no knowledge of its owner for five
+generations--covering more than a hundred and twenty years.  It has been
+well administered, however, and no tenant or other connected with it has
+had anything of which to complain.  All the same, there has been much
+natural anxiety to see the new owner, and we are all excited about the
+event of his coming.  Even I am, though I own my own estate, which,
+though adjacent, is quite apart from Castra Regis.--Here we are now in
+new ground for you.  That is the spire of Salisbury Cathedral, and when
+we leave that we shall be getting close to the old Roman county, and you
+will naturally want your eyes.  So we shall shortly have to keep our
+minds on old Mercia.  However, you need not be disappointed.  My old
+friend, Sir Nathaniel de Salis, who, like myself, is a free-holder near
+Castra Regis--his estate, Doom Tower, is over the border of Derbyshire,
+on the Peak--is coming to stay with me for the festivities to welcome
+Edgar Caswall.  He is just the sort of man you will like.  He is devoted
+to history, and is President of the Mercian Archaeological Society.  He
+knows more of our own part of the country, with its history and its
+people, than anyone else.  I expect he will have arrived before us, and
+we three can have a long chat after dinner.  He is also our local
+geologist and natural historian.  So you and he will have many interests
+in common.  Amongst other things he has a special knowledge of the Peak
+and its caverns, and knows all the old legends of prehistoric times."
+
+They spent the night at Cheltenham, and on the following morning resumed
+their journey to Stafford.  Adam's eyes were in constant employment, and
+it was not till Salton declared that they had now entered on the last
+stage of their journey, that he referred to Sir Nathaniel's coming.
+
+As the dusk was closing down, they drove on to Lesser Hill, Mr. Salton's
+house.  It was now too dark to see any details of their surroundings.
+Adam could just see that it was on the top of a hill, not quite so high
+as that which was covered by the Castle, on whose tower flew the flag,
+and which was all ablaze with moving lights, manifestly used in the
+preparations for the festivities on the morrow.  So Adam deferred his
+curiosity till daylight.  His grand-uncle was met at the door by a fine
+old man, who greeted him warmly.
+
+"I came over early as you wished.  I suppose this is your grand-nephew--I
+am glad to meet you, Mr. Adam Salton.  I am Nathaniel de Salis, and your
+uncle is one of my oldest friends."
+
+Adam, from the moment of their eyes meeting, felt as if they were already
+friends.  The meeting was a new note of welcome to those that had already
+sounded in his ears.
+
+The cordiality with which Sir Nathaniel and Adam met, made the imparting
+of information easy.  Sir Nathaniel was a clever man of the world, who
+had travelled much, and within a certain area studied deeply.  He was a
+brilliant conversationalist, as was to be expected from a successful
+diplomatist, even under unstimulating conditions.  But he had been
+touched and to a certain extent fired by the younger man's evident
+admiration and willingness to learn from him.  Accordingly the
+conversation, which began on the most friendly basis, soon warmed to an
+interest above proof, as the old man spoke of it next day to Richard
+Salton.  He knew already that his old friend wanted his grand-nephew to
+learn all he could of the subject in hand, and so had during his journey
+from the Peak put his thoughts in sequence for narration and explanation.
+Accordingly, Adam had only to listen and he must learn much that he
+wanted to know.  When dinner was over and the servants had withdrawn,
+leaving the three men at their wine, Sir Nathaniel began.
+
+"I gather from your uncle--by the way, I suppose we had better speak of
+you as uncle and nephew, instead of going into exact relationship?  In
+fact, your uncle is so old and dear a friend, that, with your permission,
+I shall drop formality with you altogether and speak of you and to you as
+Adam, as though you were his son."
+
+"I should like," answered the young man, "nothing better!"
+
+The answer warmed the hearts of both the old men, but, with the usual
+avoidance of Englishmen of emotional subjects personal to themselves,
+they instinctively returned to the previous question.  Sir Nathaniel took
+the lead.
+
+"I understand, Adam, that your uncle has posted you regarding the
+relationships of the Caswall family?"
+
+"Partly, sir; but I understood that I was to hear minuter details from
+you--if you would be so good."
+
+"I shall be delighted to tell you anything so far as my knowledge goes.
+Well, the first Caswall in our immediate record is an Edgar, head of the
+family and owner of the estate, who came into his kingdom just about the
+time that George III. did.  He had one son of about twenty-four.  There
+was a violent quarrel between the two.  No one of this generation has any
+idea of the cause; but, considering the family characteristics, we may
+take it for granted that though it was deep and violent, it was on the
+surface trivial.
+
+"The result of the quarrel was that the son left the house without a
+reconciliation or without even telling his father where he was going.  He
+never came back again.  A few years after, he died, without having in the
+meantime exchanged a word or a letter with his father.  He married abroad
+and left one son, who seems to have been brought up in ignorance of all
+belonging to him.  The gulf between them appears to have been
+unbridgable; for in time this son married and in turn had a son, but
+neither joy nor sorrow brought the sundered together.  Under such
+conditions no _rapprochement_ was to be looked for, and an utter
+indifference, founded at best on ignorance, took the place of family
+affection--even on community of interests.  It was only due to the
+watchfulness of the lawyers that the birth of this new heir was ever made
+known.  He actually spent a few months in the ancestral home.
+
+"After this the family interest merely rested on heirship of the estate.
+As no other children have been born to any of the newer generations in
+the intervening years, all hopes of heritage are now centred in the
+grandson of this man.
+
+"Now, it will be well for you to bear in mind the prevailing
+characteristics of this race.  These were well preserved and unchanging;
+one and all they are the same: cold, selfish, dominant, reckless of
+consequences in pursuit of their own will.  It was not that they did not
+keep faith, though that was a matter which gave them little concern, but
+that they took care to think beforehand of what they should do in order
+to gain their own ends.  If they should make a mistake, someone else
+should bear the burthen of it.  This was so perpetually recurrent that it
+seemed to be a part of a fixed policy.  It was no wonder that, whatever
+changes took place, they were always ensured in their own possessions.
+They were absolutely cold and hard by nature.  Not one of them--so far as
+we have any knowledge--was ever known to be touched by the softer
+sentiments, to swerve from his purpose, or hold his hand in obedience to
+the dictates of his heart.  The pictures and effigies of them all show
+their adherence to the early Roman type.  Their eyes were full; their
+hair, of raven blackness, grew thick and close and curly.  Their figures
+were massive and typical of strength.
+
+"The thick black hair, growing low down on the neck, told of vast
+physical strength and endurance.  But the most remarkable characteristic
+is the eyes.  Black, piercing, almost unendurable, they seem to contain
+in themselves a remarkable will power which there is no gainsaying.  It
+is a power that is partly racial and partly individual: a power
+impregnated with some mysterious quality, partly hypnotic, partly
+mesmeric, which seems to take away from eyes that meet them all power of
+resistance--nay, all power of wishing to resist.  With eyes like those,
+set in that all-commanding face, one would need to be strong indeed to
+think of resisting the inflexible will that lay behind.
+
+"You may think, Adam, that all this is imagination on my part, especially
+as I have never seen any of them.  So it is, but imagination based on
+deep study.  I have made use of all I know or can surmise logically
+regarding this strange race.  With such strange compelling qualities, is
+it any wonder that there is abroad an idea that in the race there is some
+demoniac possession, which tends to a more definite belief that certain
+individuals have in the past sold themselves to the Devil?
+
+"But I think we had better go to bed now.  We have a lot to get through
+to-morrow, and I want you to have your brain clear, and all your
+susceptibilities fresh.  Moreover, I want you to come with me for an
+early walk, during which we may notice, whilst the matter is fresh in our
+minds, the peculiar disposition of this place--not merely your
+grand-uncle's estate, but the lie of the country around it.  There are
+many things on which we may seek--and perhaps find--enlightenment.  The
+more we know at the start, the more things which may come into our view
+will develop themselves."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III--DIANA'S GROVE
+
+
+Curiosity took Adam Salton out of bed in the early morning, but when he
+had dressed and gone downstairs; he found that, early as he was, Sir
+Nathaniel was ahead of him.  The old gentleman was quite prepared for a
+long walk, and they started at once.
+
+Sir Nathaniel, without speaking, led the way to the east, down the hill.
+When they had descended and risen again, they found themselves on the
+eastern brink of a steep hill.  It was of lesser height than that on
+which the Castle was situated; but it was so placed that it commanded the
+various hills that crowned the ridge.  All along the ridge the rock
+cropped out, bare and bleak, but broken in rough natural castellation.
+The form of the ridge was a segment of a circle, with the higher points
+inland to the west.  In the centre rose the Castle, on the highest point
+of all.  Between the various rocky excrescences were groups of trees of
+various sizes and heights, amongst some of which were what, in the early
+morning light, looked like ruins.  These--whatever they were--were of
+massive grey stone, probably limestone rudely cut--if indeed they were
+not shaped naturally.  The fall of the ground was steep all along the
+ridge, so steep that here and there both trees and rocks and buildings
+seemed to overhang the plain far below, through which ran many streams.
+
+Sir Nathaniel stopped and looked around, as though to lose nothing of the
+effect.  The sun had climbed the eastern sky and was making all details
+clear.  He pointed with a sweeping gesture, as though calling Adam's
+attention to the extent of the view.  Having done so, he covered the
+ground more slowly, as though inviting attention to detail.  Adam was a
+willing and attentive pupil, and followed his motions exactly, missing--or
+trying to miss--nothing.
+
+"I have brought you here, Adam, because it seems to me that this is the
+spot on which to begin our investigations.  You have now in front of you
+almost the whole of the ancient kingdom of Mercia.  In fact, we see the
+whole of it except that furthest part, which is covered by the Welsh
+Marches and those parts which are hidden from where we stand by the high
+ground of the immediate west.  We can see--theoretically--the whole of
+the eastern bound of the kingdom, which ran south from the Humber to the
+Wash.  I want you to bear in mind the trend of the ground, for some time,
+sooner or later, we shall do well to have it in our mind's eye when we
+are considering the ancient traditions and superstitions, and are trying
+to find the _rationale_ of them.  Each legend, each superstition which we
+receive, will help in the understanding and possible elucidation of the
+others.  And as all such have a local basis, we can come closer to the
+truth--or the probability--by knowing the local conditions as we go
+along.  It will help us to bring to our aid such geological truth as we
+may have between us.  For instance, the building materials used in
+various ages can afford their own lessons to understanding eyes.  The
+very heights and shapes and materials of these hills--nay, even of the
+wide plain that lies between us and the sea--have in themselves the
+materials of enlightening books."
+
+"For instance, sir?" said Adam, venturing a question.
+
+"Well, look at those hills which surround the main one where the site for
+the Castle was wisely chosen--on the highest ground.  Take the others.
+There is something ostensible in each of them, and in all probability
+something unseen and unproved, but to be imagined, also."
+
+"For instance?" continued Adam.
+
+"Let us take them _seriatim_.  That to the east, where the trees are,
+lower down--that was once the location of a Roman temple, possibly
+founded on a pre-existing Druidical one.  Its name implies the former,
+and the grove of ancient oaks suggests the latter."
+
+"Please explain."
+
+"The old name translated means 'Diana's Grove.'  Then the next one higher
+than it, but just beyond it, is called '_Mercy_'--in all probability a
+corruption or familiarisation of the word _Mercia_, with a Roman pun
+included.  We learn from early manuscripts that the place was called
+_Vilula Misericordiae_.  It was originally a nunnery, founded by Queen
+Bertha, but done away with by King Penda, the reactionary to Paganism
+after St. Augustine.  Then comes your uncle's place--Lesser Hill.  Though
+it is so close to the Castle, it is not connected with it.  It is a
+freehold, and, so far as we know, of equal age.  It has always belonged
+to your family."
+
+"Then there only remains the Castle!"
+
+"That is all; but its history contains the histories of all the others--in
+fact, the whole history of early England."  Sir Nathaniel, seeing the
+expectant look on Adam's face, went on:
+
+"The history of the Castle has no beginning so far as we know.  The
+furthest records or surmises or inferences simply accept it as existing.
+Some of these--guesses, let us call them--seem to show that there was
+some sort of structure there when the Romans came, therefore it must have
+been a place of importance in Druid times--if indeed that was the
+beginning.  Naturally the Romans accepted it, as they did everything of
+the kind that was, or might be, useful.  The change is shown or inferred
+in the name Castra.  It was the highest protected ground, and so
+naturally became the most important of their camps.  A study of the map
+will show you that it must have been a most important centre.  It both
+protected the advances already made to the north, and helped to dominate
+the sea coast.  It sheltered the western marches, beyond which lay savage
+Wales--and danger.  It provided a means of getting to the Severn, round
+which lay the great Roman roads then coming into existence, and made
+possible the great waterway to the heart of England--through the Severn
+and its tributaries.  It brought the east and the west together by the
+swiftest and easiest ways known to those times.  And, finally, it
+provided means of descent on London and all the expanse of country
+watered by the Thames.
+
+"With such a centre, already known and organised, we can easily see that
+each fresh wave of invasion--the Angles, the Saxons, the Danes, and the
+Normans--found it a desirable possession and so ensured its upholding.  In
+the earlier centuries it was merely a vantage ground.  But when the
+victorious Romans brought with them the heavy solid fortifications
+impregnable to the weapons of the time, its commanding position alone
+ensured its adequate building and equipment.  Then it was that the
+fortified camp of the Caesars developed into the castle of the king.  As
+we are as yet ignorant of the names of the first kings of Mercia, no
+historian has been able to guess which of them made it his ultimate
+defence; and I suppose we shall never know now.  In process of time, as
+the arts of war developed, it increased in size and strength, and
+although recorded details are lacking, the history is written not merely
+in the stone of its building, but is inferred in the changes of
+structure.  Then the sweeping changes which followed the Norman Conquest
+wiped out all lesser records than its own.  To-day we must accept it as
+one of the earliest castles of the Conquest, probably not later than the
+time of Henry I.  Roman and Norman were both wise in their retention of
+places of approved strength or utility.  So it was that these surrounding
+heights, already established and to a certain extent proved, were
+retained.  Indeed, such characteristics as already pertained to them were
+preserved, and to-day afford to us lessons regarding things which have
+themselves long since passed away.
+
+"So much for the fortified heights; but the hollows too have their own
+story.  But how the time passes!  We must hurry home, or your uncle will
+wonder what has become of us."
+
+He started with long steps towards Lesser Hill, and Adam was soon
+furtively running in order to keep up with him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV--THE LADY ARABELLA MARCH
+
+
+"Now, there is no hurry, but so soon as you are both ready we shall
+start," Mr. Salton said when breakfast had begun.  "I want to take you
+first to see a remarkable relic of Mercia, and then we'll go to Liverpool
+through what is called 'The Great Vale of Cheshire.'  You may be
+disappointed, but take care not to prepare your mind"--this to Adam--"for
+anything stupendous or heroic.  You would not think the place a vale at
+all, unless you were told so beforehand, and had confidence in the
+veracity of the teller.  We should get to the Landing Stage in time to
+meet the _West African_, and catch Mr. Caswall as he comes ashore.  We
+want to do him honour--and, besides, it will be more pleasant to have the
+introductions over before we go to his _fete_ at the Castle."
+
+The carriage was ready, the same as had been used the previous day, but
+there were different horses--magnificent animals, and keen for work.
+Breakfast was soon over, and they shortly took their places.  The
+postillions had their orders, and were quickly on their way at an
+exhilarating pace.
+
+Presently, in obedience to Mr. Salton's signal, the carriage drew up
+opposite a great heap of stones by the wayside.
+
+"Here, Adam," he said, "is something that you of all men should not pass
+by unnoticed.  That heap of stones brings us at once to the dawn of the
+Anglian kingdom.  It was begun more than a thousand years ago--in the
+latter part of the seventh century--in memory of a murder.  Wulfere, King
+of Mercia, nephew of Penda, here murdered his two sons for embracing
+Christianity.  As was the custom of the time, each passer-by added a
+stone to the memorial heap.  Penda represented heathen reaction after St.
+Augustine's mission.  Sir Nathaniel can tell you as much as you want
+about this, and put you, if you wish, on the track of such accurate
+knowledge as there is."
+
+Whilst they were looking at the heap of stones, they noticed that another
+carriage had drawn up beside them, and the passenger--there was only
+one--was regarding them curiously.  The carriage was an old heavy
+travelling one, with arms blazoned on it gorgeously.  The men took off
+their hats, as the occupant, a lady, addressed them.
+
+"How do you do, Sir Nathaniel?  How do you do, Mr. Salton?  I hope you
+have not met with any accident.  Look at me!"
+
+As she spoke she pointed to where one of the heavy springs was broken
+across, the broken metal showing bright.  Adam spoke up at once:
+
+"Oh, that can soon be put right."
+
+"Soon?  There is no one near who can mend a break like that."
+
+"I can."
+
+"You!"  She looked incredulously at the dapper young gentleman who spoke.
+"You--why, it's a workman's job."
+
+"All right, I am a workman--though that is not the only sort of work I
+do.  I am an Australian, and, as we have to move about fast, we are all
+trained to farriery and such mechanics as come into travel--I am quite at
+your service."
+
+"I hardly know how to thank you for your kindness, of which I gladly
+avail myself.  I don't know what else I can do, as I wish to meet Mr.
+Caswall of Castra Regis, who arrives home from Africa to-day.  It is a
+notable home-coming; all the countryside want to do him honour."  She
+looked at the old men and quickly made up her mind as to the identity of
+the stranger.  "You must be Mr. Adam Salton of Lesser Hill.  I am Lady
+Arabella March of Diana's Grove."  As she spoke she turned slightly to
+Mr. Salton, who took the hint and made a formal introduction.
+
+So soon as this was done, Adam took some tools from his uncle's carriage,
+and at once began work on the broken spring.  He was an expert workman,
+and the breach was soon made good.  Adam was gathering the tools which he
+had been using--which, after the manner of all workmen, had been
+scattered about--when he noticed that several black snakes had crawled
+out from the heap of stones and were gathering round him.  This naturally
+occupied his mind, and he was not thinking of anything else when he
+noticed Lady Arabella, who had opened the door of the carriage, slip from
+it with a quick gliding motion.  She was already among the snakes when he
+called out to warn her.  But there seemed to be no need of warning.  The
+snakes had turned and were wriggling back to the mound as quickly as they
+could.  He laughed to himself behind his teeth as he whispered, "No need
+to fear there.  They seem much more afraid of her than she of them."  All
+the same he began to beat on the ground with a stick which was lying
+close to him, with the instinct of one used to such vermin.  In an
+instant he was alone beside the mound with Lady Arabella, who appeared
+quite unconcerned at the incident.  Then he took a long look at her, and
+her dress alone was sufficient to attract attention.  She was clad in
+some kind of soft white stuff, which clung close to her form, showing to
+the full every movement of her sinuous figure.  She wore a close-fitting
+cap of some fine fur of dazzling white.  Coiled round her white throat
+was a large necklace of emeralds, whose profusion of colour dazzled when
+the sun shone on them.  Her voice was peculiar, very low and sweet, and
+so soft that the dominant note was of sibilation.  Her hands, too, were
+peculiar--long, flexible, white, with a strange movement as of waving
+gently to and fro.
+
+She appeared quite at ease, and, after thanking Adam, said that if any of
+his uncle's party were going to Liverpool she would be most happy to join
+forces.
+
+"Whilst you are staying here, Mr. Salton, you must look on the grounds of
+Diana's Grove as your own, so that you may come and go just as you do in
+Lesser Hill.  There are some fine views, and not a few natural
+curiosities which are sure to interest you, if you are a student of
+natural history--specially of an earlier kind, when the world was
+younger."
+
+The heartiness with which she spoke, and the warmth of her words--not of
+her manner, which was cold and distant--made him suspicious.  In the
+meantime both his uncle and Sir Nathaniel had thanked her for the
+invitation--of which, however, they said they were unable to avail
+themselves.  Adam had a suspicion that, though she answered regretfully,
+she was in reality relieved.  When he had got into the carriage with the
+two old men, and they had driven off, he was not surprised when Sir
+Nathaniel spoke.
+
+"I could not but feel that she was glad to be rid of us.  She can play
+her game better alone!"
+
+"What is her game?" asked Adam unthinkingly.
+
+"All the county knows it, my boy.  Caswall is a very rich man.  Her
+husband was rich when she married him--or seemed to be.  When he
+committed suicide, it was found that he had nothing left, and the estate
+was mortgaged up to the hilt.  Her only hope is in a rich marriage.  I
+suppose I need not draw any conclusion; you can do that as well as I
+can."
+
+Adam remained silent nearly all the time they were travelling through the
+alleged Vale of Cheshire.  He thought much during that journey and came
+to several conclusions, though his lips were unmoved.  One of these
+conclusions was that he would be very careful about paying any attention
+to Lady Arabella.  He was himself a rich man, how rich not even his uncle
+had the least idea, and would have been surprised had he known.
+
+The remainder of the journey was uneventful, and upon arrival at
+Liverpool they went aboard the _West African_, which had just come to the
+landing-stage.  There his uncle introduced himself to Mr. Caswall, and
+followed this up by introducing Sir Nathaniel and then Adam.  The new-
+comer received them graciously, and said what a pleasure it was to be
+coming home after so long an absence of his family from their old seat.
+Adam was pleased at the warmth of the reception; but he could not avoid a
+feeling of repugnance at the man's face.  He was trying hard to overcome
+this when a diversion was caused by the arrival of Lady Arabella.  The
+diversion was welcome to all; the two Saltons and Sir Nathaniel were
+shocked at Caswall's face--so hard, so ruthless, so selfish, so dominant.
+"God help any," was the common thought, "who is under the domination of
+such a man!"
+
+Presently his African servant approached him, and at once their thoughts
+changed to a larger toleration.  Caswall looked indeed a savage--but a
+cultured savage.  In him were traces of the softening civilisation of
+ages--of some of the higher instincts and education of man, no matter how
+rudimentary these might be.  But the face of Oolanga, as his master
+called him, was unreformed, unsoftened savage, and inherent in it were
+all the hideous possibilities of a lost, devil-ridden child of the forest
+and the swamp--the lowest of all created things that could be regarded as
+in some form ostensibly human.  Lady Arabella and Oolanga arrived almost
+simultaneously, and Adam was surprised to notice what effect their
+appearance had on each other.  The woman seemed as if she would not--could
+not--condescend to exhibit any concern or interest in such a creature.  On
+the other hand, the negro's bearing was such as in itself to justify her
+pride.  He treated her not merely as a slave treats his master, but as a
+worshipper would treat a deity.  He knelt before her with his hands out-
+stretched and his forehead in the dust.  So long as she remained he did
+not move; it was only when she went over to Caswall that he relaxed his
+attitude of devotion and stood by respectfully.
+
+Adam spoke to his own man, Davenport, who was standing by, having arrived
+with the bailiff of Lesser Hill, who had followed Mr. Salton in a pony
+trap.  As he spoke, he pointed to an attentive ship's steward, and
+presently the two men were conversing.
+
+"I think we ought to be moving," Mr. Salton said to Adam.  "I have some
+things to do in Liverpool, and I am sure that both Mr. Caswall and Lady
+Arabella would like to get under weigh for Castra Regis."
+
+"I too, sir, would like to do something," replied Adam.  "I want to find
+out where Ross, the animal merchant, lives--I want to take a small animal
+home with me, if you don't mind.  He is only a little thing, and will be
+no trouble."
+
+"Of course not, my boy.  What kind of animal is it that you want?"
+
+"A mongoose."
+
+"A mongoose!  What on earth do you want it for?"
+
+"To kill snakes."
+
+"Good!"  The old man remembered the mound of stones.  No explanation was
+needed.
+
+When Ross heard what was wanted, he asked:
+
+"Do you want something special, or will an ordinary mongoose do?"
+
+"Well, of course I want a good one.  But I see no need for anything
+special.  It is for ordinary use."
+
+"I can let you have a choice of ordinary ones.  I only asked, because I
+have in stock a very special one which I got lately from Nepaul.  He has
+a record of his own.  He killed a king cobra that had been seen in the
+Rajah's garden.  But I don't suppose we have any snakes of the kind in
+this cold climate--I daresay an ordinary one will do."
+
+When Adam got back to the carriage, carefully carrying the box with the
+mongoose, Sir Nathaniel said: "Hullo! what have you got there?"
+
+"A mongoose."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To kill snakes!"
+
+Sir Nathaniel laughed.
+
+"I heard Lady Arabella's invitation to you to come to Diana's Grove."
+
+"Well, what on earth has that got to do with it?"
+
+"Nothing directly that I know of.  But we shall see."  Adam waited, and
+the old man went on: "Have you by any chance heard the other name which
+was given long ago to that place."
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"It was called--Look here, this subject wants a lot of talking over.
+Suppose we wait till we are alone and have lots of time before us."
+
+"All right, sir."  Adam was filled with curiosity, but he thought it
+better not to hurry matters.  All would come in good time.  Then the
+three men returned home, leaving Mr. Caswall to spend the night in
+Liverpool.
+
+The following day the Lesser Hill party set out for Castra Regis, and for
+the time Adam thought no more of Diana's Grove or of what mysteries it
+had contained--or might still contain.
+
+The guests were crowding in, and special places were marked for important
+people.  Adam, seeing so many persons of varied degree, looked round for
+Lady Arabella, but could not locate her.  It was only when he saw the old-
+fashioned travelling carriage approach and heard the sound of cheering
+which went with it, that he realised that Edgar Caswall had arrived.
+Then, on looking more closely, he saw that Lady Arabella, dressed as he
+had seen her last, was seated beside him.  When the carriage drew up at
+the great flight of steps, the host jumped down and gave her his hand.
+
+It was evident to all that she was the chief guest at the festivities.  It
+was not long before the seats on the dais were filled, while the tenants
+and guests of lesser importance had occupied all the coigns of vantage
+not reserved.  The order of the day had been carefully arranged by a
+committee.  There were some speeches, happily neither many nor long; and
+then festivities were suspended till the time for feasting arrived.  In
+the interval Caswall walked among his guests, speaking to all in a
+friendly manner and expressing a general welcome.  The other guests came
+down from the dais and followed his example, so there was unceremonious
+meeting and greeting between gentle and simple.
+
+Adam Salton naturally followed with his eyes all that went on within
+their scope, taking note of all who seemed to afford any interest.  He
+was young and a man and a stranger from a far distance; so on all these
+accounts he naturally took stock rather of the women than of the men, and
+of these, those who were young and attractive.  There were lots of pretty
+girls among the crowd, and Adam, who was a handsome young man and well
+set up, got his full share of admiring glances.  These did not concern
+him much, and he remained unmoved until there came along a group of
+three, by their dress and bearing, of the farmer class.  One was a sturdy
+old man; the other two were good-looking girls, one of a little over
+twenty, the other not quite so old.  So soon as Adam's eyes met those of
+the younger girl, who stood nearest to him, some sort of electricity
+flashed--that divine spark which begins by recognition, and ends in
+obedience.  Men call it "Love."
+
+Both his companions noticed how much Adam was taken by the pretty girl,
+and spoke of her to him in a way which made his heart warm to them.
+
+"Did you notice that party that passed?  The old man is Michael Watford,
+one of the tenants of Mr. Caswall.  He occupies Mercy Farm, which Sir
+Nathaniel pointed out to you to-day.  The girls are his grand-daughters,
+the elder, Lilla, being the only child of his elder son, who died when
+she was less than a year old.  His wife died on the same day.  She is a
+good girl--as good as she is pretty.  The other is her first cousin, the
+daughter of Watford's second son.  He went for a soldier when he was just
+over twenty, and was drafted abroad.  He was not a good correspondent,
+though he was a good enough son.  A few letters came, and then his father
+heard from the colonel of his regiment that he had been killed by dacoits
+in Burmah.  He heard from the same source that his boy had been married
+to a Burmese, and that there was a daughter only a year old.  Watford had
+the child brought home, and she grew up beside Lilla.  The only thing
+that they heard of her birth was that her name was Mimi.  The two
+children adored each other, and do to this day.  Strange how different
+they are!  Lilla all fair, like the old Saxon stock from which she is
+sprung; Mimi showing a trace of her mother's race.  Lilla is as gentle as
+a dove, but Mimi's black eyes can glow whenever she is upset.  The only
+thing that upsets her is when anything happens to injure or threaten or
+annoy Lilla.  Then her eyes glow as do the eyes of a bird when her young
+are menaced."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V--THE WHITE WORM
+
+
+Mr. Salton introduced Adam to Mr. Watford and his grand-daughters, and
+they all moved on together.  Of course neighbours in the position of the
+Watfords knew all about Adam Salton, his relationship, circumstances, and
+prospects.  So it would have been strange indeed if both girls did not
+dream of possibilities of the future.  In agricultural England, eligible
+men of any class are rare.  This particular man was specially eligible,
+for he did not belong to a class in which barriers of caste were strong.
+So when it began to be noticed that he walked beside Mimi Watford and
+seemed to desire her society, all their friends endeavoured to give the
+promising affair a helping hand.  When the gongs sounded for the banquet,
+he went with her into the tent where her grandfather had seats.  Mr.
+Salton and Sir Nathaniel noticed that the young man did not come to claim
+his appointed place at the dais table; but they understood and made no
+remark, or indeed did not seem to notice his absence.
+
+Lady Arabella sat as before at Edgar Caswall's right hand.  She was
+certainly a striking and unusual woman, and to all it seemed fitting from
+her rank and personal qualities that she should be the chosen partner of
+the heir on his first appearance.  Of course nothing was said openly by
+those of her own class who were present; but words were not necessary
+when so much could be expressed by nods and smiles.  It seemed to be an
+accepted thing that at last there was to be a mistress of Castra Regis,
+and that she was present amongst them.  There were not lacking some who,
+whilst admitting all her charm and beauty, placed her in the second rank,
+Lilla Watford being marked as first.  There was sufficient divergence of
+type, as well as of individual beauty, to allow of fair comment; Lady
+Arabella represented the aristocratic type, and Lilla that of the
+commonalty.
+
+When the dusk began to thicken, Mr. Salton and Sir Nathaniel walked
+home--the trap had been sent away early in the day--leaving Adam to
+follow in his own time.  He came in earlier than was expected, and seemed
+upset about something.  Neither of the elders made any comment.  They all
+lit cigarettes, and, as dinner-time was close at hand, went to their
+rooms to get ready.
+
+Adam had evidently been thinking in the interval.  He joined the others
+in the drawing-room, looking ruffled and impatient--a condition of things
+seen for the first time.  The others, with the patience--or the
+experience--of age, trusted to time to unfold and explain things.  They
+had not long to wait.  After sitting down and standing up several times,
+Adam suddenly burst out.
+
+"That fellow seems to think he owns the earth.  Can't he let people
+alone!  He seems to think that he has only to throw his handkerchief to
+any woman, and be her master."
+
+This outburst was in itself enlightening.  Only thwarted affection in
+some guise could produce this feeling in an amiable young man.  Sir
+Nathaniel, as an old diplomatist, had a way of understanding, as if by
+foreknowledge, the true inwardness of things, and asked suddenly, but in
+a matter-of-fact, indifferent voice:
+
+"Was he after Lilla?"
+
+"Yes, and the fellow didn't lose any time either.  Almost as soon as they
+met, he began to butter her up, and tell her how beautiful she was.  Why,
+before he left her side, he had asked himself to tea to-morrow at Mercy
+Farm.  Stupid ass!  He might see that the girl isn't his sort!  I never
+saw anything like it.  It was just like a hawk and a pigeon."
+
+As he spoke, Sir Nathaniel turned and looked at Mr. Salton--a keen look
+which implied a full understanding.
+
+"Tell us all about it, Adam.  There are still a few minutes before
+dinner, and we shall all have better appetites when we have come to some
+conclusion on this matter."
+
+"There is nothing to tell, sir; that is the worst of it.  I am bound to
+say that there was not a word said that a human being could object to.  He
+was very civil, and all that was proper--just what a landlord might be to
+a tenant's daughter . . . Yet--yet--well, I don't know how it was, but it
+made my blood boil."
+
+"How did the hawk and the pigeon come in?"  Sir Nathaniel's voice was
+soft and soothing, nothing of contradiction or overdone curiosity in it--a
+tone eminently suited to win confidence.
+
+"I can hardly explain.  I can only say that he looked like a hawk and she
+like a dove--and, now that I think of it, that is what they each did look
+like; and do look like in their normal condition."
+
+"That is so!" came the soft voice of Sir Nathaniel.
+
+Adam went on:
+
+"Perhaps that early Roman look of his set me off.  But I wanted to
+protect her; she seemed in danger."
+
+"She seems in danger, in a way, from all you young men.  I couldn't help
+noticing the way that even you looked--as if you wished to absorb her!"
+
+"I hope both you young men will keep your heads cool," put in Mr. Salton.
+"You know, Adam, it won't do to have any quarrel between you, especially
+so soon after his home-coming and your arrival here.  We must think of
+the feelings and happiness of our neighbours; mustn't we?"
+
+"I hope so, sir.  I assure you that, whatever may happen, or even
+threaten, I shall obey your wishes in this as in all things."
+
+"Hush!" whispered Sir Nathaniel, who heard the servants in the passage
+bringing dinner.
+
+After dinner, over the walnuts and the wine, Sir Nathaniel returned to
+the subject of the local legends.
+
+"It will perhaps be a less dangerous topic for us to discuss than more
+recent ones."
+
+"All right, sir," said Adam heartily.  "I think you may depend on me now
+with regard to any topic.  I can even discuss Mr. Caswall.  Indeed, I may
+meet him to-morrow.  He is going, as I said, to call at Mercy Farm at
+three o'clock--but I have an appointment at two."
+
+"I notice," said Mr. Salton, "that you do not lose any time."
+
+The two old men once more looked at each other steadily.  Then, lest the
+mood of his listener should change with delay, Sir Nathaniel began at
+once:
+
+"I don't propose to tell you all the legends of Mercia, or even to make a
+selection of them.  It will be better, I think, for our purpose if we
+consider a few facts--recorded or unrecorded--about this neighbourhood.  I
+think we might begin with Diana's Grove.  It has roots in the different
+epochs of our history, and each has its special crop of legend.  The
+Druid and the Roman are too far off for matters of detail; but it seems
+to me the Saxon and the Angles are near enough to yield material for
+legendary lore.  We find that this particular place had another name
+besides Diana's Grove.  This was manifestly of Roman origin, or of
+Grecian accepted as Roman.  The other is more pregnant of adventure and
+romance than the Roman name.  In Mercian tongue it was 'The Lair of the
+White Worm.'  This needs a word of explanation at the beginning.
+
+"In the dawn of the language, the word 'worm' had a somewhat different
+meaning from that in use to-day.  It was an adaptation of the Anglo-Saxon
+'wyrm,' meaning a dragon or snake; or from the Gothic 'waurms,' a
+serpent; or the Icelandic 'ormur,' or the German 'wurm.'  We gather that
+it conveyed originally an idea of size and power, not as now in the
+diminutive of both these meanings.  Here legendary history helps us.  We
+have the well-known legend of the 'Worm Well' of Lambton Castle, and that
+of the 'Laidly Worm of Spindleston Heugh' near Bamborough.  In both these
+legends the 'worm' was a monster of vast size and power--a veritable
+dragon or serpent, such as legend attributes to vast fens or quags where
+there was illimitable room for expansion.  A glance at a geological map
+will show that whatever truth there may have been of the actuality of
+such monsters in the early geologic periods, at least there was plenty of
+possibility.  In England there were originally vast plains where the
+plentiful supply of water could gather.  The streams were deep and slow,
+and there were holes of abysmal depth, where any kind and size of
+antediluvian monster could find a habitat.  In places, which now we can
+see from our windows, were mud-holes a hundred or more feet deep.  Who
+can tell us when the age of the monsters which flourished in slime came
+to an end?  There must have been places and conditions which made for
+greater longevity, greater size, greater strength than was usual.  Such
+over-lappings may have come down even to our earlier centuries.  Nay, are
+there not now creatures of a vastness of bulk regarded by the generality
+of men as impossible?  Even in our own day there are seen the traces of
+animals, if not the animals themselves, of stupendous size--veritable
+survivals from earlier ages, preserved by some special qualities in their
+habitats.  I remember meeting a distinguished man in India, who had the
+reputation of being a great shikaree, who told me that the greatest
+temptation he had ever had in his life was to shoot a giant snake which
+he had come across in the Terai of Upper India.  He was on a
+tiger-shooting expedition, and as his elephant was crossing a nullah, it
+squealed.  He looked down from his howdah and saw that the elephant had
+stepped across the body of a snake which was dragging itself through the
+jungle.  'So far as I could see,' he said, 'it must have been eighty or
+one hundred feet in length.  Fully forty or fifty feet was on each side
+of the track, and though the weight which it dragged had thinned it, it
+was as thick round as a man's body.  I suppose you know that when you are
+after tiger, it is a point of honour not to shoot at anything else, as
+life may depend on it.  I could easily have spined this monster, but I
+felt that I must not--so, with regret, I had to let it go.'
+
+"Just imagine such a monster anywhere in this country, and at once we
+could get a sort of idea of the 'worms,' which possibly did frequent the
+great morasses which spread round the mouths of many of the great
+European rivers."
+
+"I haven't the least doubt, sir, that there may have been such monsters
+as you have spoken of still existing at a much later period than is
+generally accepted," replied Adam.  "Also, if there were such things,
+that this was the very place for them.  I have tried to think over the
+matter since you pointed out the configuration of the ground.  But it
+seems to me that there is a hiatus somewhere.  Are there not mechanical
+difficulties?"
+
+"In what way?"
+
+"Well, our antique monster must have been mighty heavy, and the distances
+he had to travel were long and the ways difficult.  From where we are now
+sitting down to the level of the mud-holes is a distance of several
+hundred feet--I am leaving out of consideration altogether any lateral
+distance.  Is it possible that there was a way by which a monster could
+travel up and down, and yet no chance recorder have ever seen him?  Of
+course we have the legends; but is not some more exact evidence necessary
+in a scientific investigation?"
+
+"My dear Adam, all you say is perfectly right, and, were we starting on
+such an investigation, we could not do better than follow your reasoning.
+But, my dear boy, you must remember that all this took place thousands of
+years ago.  You must remember, too, that all records of the kind that
+would help us are lacking.  Also, that the places to be considered were
+desert, so far as human habitation or population are considered.  In the
+vast desolation of such a place as complied with the necessary
+conditions, there must have been such profusion of natural growth as
+would bar the progress of men formed as we are.  The lair of such a
+monster would not have been disturbed for hundreds--or thousands--of
+years.  Moreover, these creatures must have occupied places quite
+inaccessible to man.  A snake who could make himself comfortable in a
+quagmire, a hundred feet deep, would be protected on the outskirts by
+such stupendous morasses as now no longer exist, or which, if they exist
+anywhere at all, can be on very few places on the earth's surface.  Far
+be it from me to say that in more elemental times such things could not
+have been.  The condition belongs to the geologic age--the great birth
+and growth of the world, when natural forces ran riot, when the struggle
+for existence was so savage that no vitality which was not founded in a
+gigantic form could have even a possibility of survival.  That such a
+time existed, we have evidences in geology, but there only; we can never
+expect proofs such as this age demands.  We can only imagine or surmise
+such things--or such conditions and such forces as overcame them."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI--HAWK AND PIGEON
+
+
+At breakfast-time next morning Sir Nathaniel and Mr. Salton were seated
+when Adam came hurriedly into the room.
+
+"Any news?" asked his uncle mechanically.
+
+"Four."
+
+"Four what?" asked Sir Nathaniel.
+
+"Snakes," said Adam, helping himself to a grilled kidney.
+
+"Four snakes.  I don't understand."
+
+"Mongoose," said Adam, and then added explanatorily: "I was out with the
+mongoose just after three."
+
+"Four snakes in one morning!  Why, I didn't know there were so many on
+the Brow"--the local name for the western cliff.  "I hope that wasn't the
+consequence of our talk of last night?"
+
+"It was, sir.  But not directly."
+
+"But, God bless my soul, you didn't expect to get a snake like the
+Lambton worm, did you?  Why, a mongoose, to tackle a monster like that--if
+there were one--would have to be bigger than a haystack."
+
+"These were ordinary snakes, about as big as a walking-stick."
+
+"Well, it's pleasant to be rid of them, big or little.  That is a good
+mongoose, I am sure; he'll clear out all such vermin round here," said
+Mr. Salton.
+
+Adam went quietly on with his breakfast.  Killing a few snakes in a
+morning was no new experience to him.  He left the room the moment
+breakfast was finished and went to the study that his uncle had arranged
+for him.  Both Sir Nathaniel and Mr. Salton took it that he wanted to be
+by himself, so as to avoid any questioning or talk of the visit that he
+was to make that afternoon.  They saw nothing further of him till about
+half-an-hour before dinner-time.  Then he came quietly into the smoking-
+room, where Mr. Salton and Sir Nathaniel were sitting together, ready
+dressed.
+
+"I suppose there is no use waiting.  We had better get it over at once,"
+remarked Adam.
+
+His uncle, thinking to make things easier for him, said: "Get what over?"
+
+There was a sign of shyness about him at this.  He stammered a little at
+first, but his voice became more even as he went on.
+
+"My visit to Mercy Farm."
+
+Mr. Salton waited eagerly.  The old diplomatist simply smiled.
+
+"I suppose you both know that I was much interested yesterday in the
+Watfords?"  There was no denial or fending off the question.  Both the
+old men smiled acquiescence.  Adam went on: "I meant you to see it--both
+of you.  You, uncle, because you are my uncle and the nearest of my own
+kin, and, moreover, you couldn't have been more kind to me or made me
+more welcome if you had been my own father."  Mr. Salton said nothing.  He
+simply held out his hand, and the other took it and held it for a few
+seconds.  "And you, sir, because you have shown me something of the same
+affection which in my wildest dreams of home I had no right to expect."
+He stopped for an instant, much moved.
+
+Sir Nathaniel answered softly, laying his hand on the youth's shoulder.
+
+"You are right, my boy; quite right.  That is the proper way to look at
+it.  And I may tell you that we old men, who have no children of our own,
+feel our hearts growing warm when we hear words like those."
+
+Then Adam hurried on, speaking with a rush, as if he wanted to come to
+the crucial point.
+
+"Mr. Watford had not come in, but Lilla and Mimi were at home, and they
+made me feel very welcome.  They have all a great regard for my uncle.  I
+am glad of that any way, for I like them all--much.  We were having tea,
+when Mr. Caswall came to the door, attended by the negro.  Lilla opened
+the door herself.  The window of the living-room at the farm is a large
+one, and from within you cannot help seeing anyone coming.  Mr. Caswall
+said he had ventured to call, as he wished to make the acquaintance of
+all his tenants, in a less formal way, and more individually, than had
+been possible to him on the previous day.  The girls made him
+welcome--they are very sweet girls those, sir; someone will be very happy
+some day there--with either of them."
+
+"And that man may be you, Adam," said Mr. Salton heartily.
+
+A sad look came over the young man's eyes, and the fire his uncle had
+seen there died out.  Likewise the timbre left his voice, making it sound
+lonely.
+
+"Such might crown my life.  But that happiness, I fear, is not for me--or
+not without pain and loss and woe."
+
+"Well, it's early days yet!" cried Sir Nathaniel heartily.
+
+The young man turned on him his eyes, which had now grown excessively
+sad.
+
+"Yesterday--a few hours ago--that remark would have given me new hope--new
+courage; but since then I have learned too much."
+
+The old man, skilled in the human heart, did not attempt to argue in such
+a matter.
+
+"Too early to give in, my boy."
+
+"I am not of a giving-in kind," replied the young man earnestly.  "But,
+after all, it is wise to realise a truth.  And when a man, though he is
+young, feels as I do--as I have felt ever since yesterday, when I first
+saw Mimi's eyes--his heart jumps.  He does not need to learn things.  He
+knows."
+
+There was silence in the room, during which the twilight stole on
+imperceptibly.  It was Adam who again broke the silence.
+
+"Do you know, uncle, if we have any second sight in our family?"
+
+"No, not that I ever heard about.  Why?"
+
+"Because," he answered slowly, "I have a conviction which seems to answer
+all the conditions of second sight."
+
+"And then?" asked the old man, much perturbed.
+
+"And then the usual inevitable.  What in the Hebrides and other places,
+where the Sight is a cult--a belief--is called 'the doom'--the court from
+which there is no appeal.  I have often heard of second sight--we have
+many western Scots in Australia; but I have realised more of its true
+inwardness in an instant of this afternoon than I did in the whole of my
+life previously--a granite wall stretching up to the very heavens, so
+high and so dark that the eye of God Himself cannot see beyond.  Well, if
+the Doom must come, it must.  That is all."
+
+The voice of Sir Nathaniel broke in, smooth and sweet and grave.
+
+"Can there not be a fight for it?  There can for most things."
+
+"For most things, yes, but for the Doom, no.  What a man can do I shall
+do.  There will be--must be--a fight.  When and where and how I know not,
+but a fight there will be.  But, after all, what is a man in such a
+case?"
+
+"Adam, there are three of us."  Salton looked at his old friend as he
+spoke, and that old friend's eyes blazed.
+
+"Ay, three of us," he said, and his voice rang.
+
+There was again a pause, and Sir Nathaniel endeavoured to get back to
+less emotional and more neutral ground.
+
+"Tell us of the rest of the meeting.  Remember we are all pledged to
+this.  It is a fight _a l'outrance_, and we can afford to throw away or
+forgo no chance."
+
+"We shall throw away or lose nothing that we can help.  We fight to win,
+and the stake is a life--perhaps more than one--we shall see."  Then he
+went on in a conversational tone, such as he had used when he spoke of
+the coming to the farm of Edgar Caswall: "When Mr. Caswall came in, the
+negro went a short distance away and there remained.  It gave me the idea
+that he expected to be called, and intended to remain in sight, or within
+hail.  Then Mimi got another cup and made fresh tea, and we all went on
+together."
+
+"Was there anything uncommon--were you all quite friendly?" asked Sir
+Nathaniel quietly.
+
+"Quite friendly.  There was nothing that I could notice out of the
+common--except," he went on, with a slight hardening of the voice,
+"except that he kept his eyes fixed on Lilla, in a way which was quite
+intolerable to any man who might hold her dear."
+
+"Now, in what way did he look?" asked Sir Nathaniel.
+
+"There was nothing in itself offensive; but no one could help noticing
+it."
+
+"You did.  Miss Watford herself, who was the victim, and Mr. Caswall, who
+was the offender, are out of range as witnesses.  Was there anyone else
+who noticed?"
+
+"Mimi did.  Her face flamed with anger as she saw the look."
+
+"What kind of look was it?  Over-ardent or too admiring, or what?  Was it
+the look of a lover, or one who fain would be?  You understand?"
+
+"Yes, sir, I quite understand.  Anything of that sort I should of course
+notice.  It would be part of my preparation for keeping my
+self-control--to which I am pledged."
+
+"If it were not amatory, was it threatening?  Where was the offence?"
+
+Adam smiled kindly at the old man.
+
+"It was not amatory.  Even if it was, such was to be expected.  I should
+be the last man in the world to object, since I am myself an offender in
+that respect.  Moreover, not only have I been taught to fight fair, but
+by nature I believe I am just.  I would be as tolerant of and as liberal
+to a rival as I should expect him to be to me.  No, the look I mean was
+nothing of that kind.  And so long as it did not lack proper respect, I
+should not of my own part condescend to notice it.  Did you ever study
+the eyes of a hound?"
+
+"At rest?"
+
+"No, when he is following his instincts!  Or, better still," Adam went
+on, "the eyes of a bird of prey when he is following his instincts.  Not
+when he is swooping, but merely when he is watching his quarry?"
+
+"No," said Sir Nathaniel, "I don't know that I ever did.  Why, may I
+ask?"
+
+"That was the look.  Certainly not amatory or anything of that kind--yet
+it was, it struck me, more dangerous, if not so deadly as an actual
+threatening."
+
+Again there was a silence, which Sir Nathaniel broke as he stood up:
+
+"I think it would be well if we all thought over this by ourselves.  Then
+we can renew the subject."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII--OOLANGA
+
+
+Mr. Salton had an appointment for six o'clock at Liverpool.  When he had
+driven off, Sir Nathaniel took Adam by the arm.
+
+"May I come with you for a while to your study?  I want to speak to you
+privately without your uncle knowing about it, or even what the subject
+is.  You don't mind, do you?  It is not idle curiosity.  No, no.  It is
+on the subject to which we are all committed."
+
+"Is it necessary to keep my uncle in the dark about it?  He might be
+offended."
+
+"It is not necessary; but it is advisable.  It is for his sake that I
+asked.  My friend is an old man, and it might concern him unduly--even
+alarm him.  I promise you there shall be nothing that could cause him
+anxiety in our silence, or at which he could take umbrage."
+
+"Go on, sir!" said Adam simply.
+
+"You see, your uncle is now an old man.  I know it, for we were boys
+together.  He has led an uneventful and somewhat self-contained life, so
+that any such condition of things as has now arisen is apt to perplex him
+from its very strangeness.  In fact, any new matter is trying to old
+people.  It has its own disturbances and its own anxieties, and neither
+of these things are good for lives that should be restful.  Your uncle is
+a strong man, with a very happy and placid nature.  Given health and
+ordinary conditions of life, there is no reason why he should not live to
+be a hundred.  You and I, therefore, who both love him, though in
+different ways, should make it our business to protect him from all
+disturbing influences.  I am sure you will agree with me that any labour
+to this end would be well spent.  All right, my boy!  I see your answer
+in your eyes; so we need say no more of that.  And now," here his voice
+changed, "tell me all that took place at that interview.  There are
+strange things in front of us--how strange we cannot at present even
+guess.  Doubtless some of the difficult things to understand which lie
+behind the veil will in time be shown to us to see and to understand.  In
+the meantime, all we can do is to work patiently, fearlessly, and
+unselfishly, to an end that we think is right.  You had got so far as
+where Lilla opened the door to Mr. Caswall and the negro.  You also
+observed that Mimi was disturbed in her mind at the way Mr. Caswall
+looked at her cousin."
+
+"Certainly--though 'disturbed' is a poor way of expressing her
+objection."
+
+"Can you remember well enough to describe Caswall's eyes, and how Lilla
+looked, and what Mimi said and did?  Also Oolanga, Caswall's West African
+servant."
+
+"I'll do what I can, sir.  All the time Mr. Caswall was staring, he kept
+his eyes fixed and motionless--but not as if he was in a trance.  His
+forehead was wrinkled up, as it is when one is trying to see through or
+into something.  At the best of times his face has not a gentle
+expression; but when it was screwed up like that it was almost
+diabolical.  It frightened poor Lilla so that she trembled, and after a
+bit got so pale that I thought she had fainted.  However, she held up and
+tried to stare back, but in a feeble kind of way.  Then Mimi came close
+and held her hand.  That braced her up, and--still, never ceasing her
+return stare--she got colour again and seemed more like herself."
+
+"Did he stare too?"
+
+"More than ever.  The weaker Lilla seemed, the stronger he became, just
+as if he were feeding on her strength.  All at once she turned round,
+threw up her hands, and fell down in a faint.  I could not see what else
+happened just then, for Mimi had thrown herself on her knees beside her
+and hid her from me.  Then there was something like a black shadow
+between us, and there was the nigger, looking more like a malignant devil
+than ever.  I am not usually a patient man, and the sight of that ugly
+devil is enough to make one's blood boil.  When he saw my face, he seemed
+to realise danger--immediate danger--and slunk out of the room as
+noiselessly as if he had been blown out.  I learned one thing, however--he
+is an enemy, if ever a man had one."
+
+"That still leaves us three to two!" put in Sir Nathaniel.
+
+"Then Caswall slunk out, much as the nigger had done.  When he had gone,
+Lilla recovered at once."
+
+"Now," said Sir Nathaniel, anxious to restore peace, "have you found out
+anything yet regarding the negro?  I am anxious to be posted regarding
+him.  I fear there will be, or may be, grave trouble with him."
+
+"Yes, sir, I've heard a good deal about him--of course it is not
+official; but hearsay must guide us at first.  You know my man
+Davenport--private secretary, confidential man of business, and general
+factotum.  He is devoted to me, and has my full confidence.  I asked him
+to stay on board the _West African_ and have a good look round, and find
+out what he could about Mr. Caswall.  Naturally, he was struck with the
+aboriginal savage.  He found one of the ship's stewards, who had been on
+the regular voyages to South Africa.  He knew Oolanga and had made a
+study of him.  He is a man who gets on well with niggers, and they open
+their hearts to him.  It seems that this Oolanga is quite a great person
+in the nigger world of the African West Coast.  He has the two things
+which men of his own colour respect: he can make them afraid, and he is
+lavish with money.  I don't know whose money--but that does not matter.
+They are always ready to trumpet his greatness.  Evil greatness it is--but
+neither does that matter.  Briefly, this is his history.  He was
+originally a witch-finder--about as low an occupation as exists amongst
+aboriginal savages.  Then he got up in the world and became an Obi-man,
+which gives an opportunity to wealth _via_ blackmail.  Finally, he
+reached the highest honour in hellish service.  He became a user of
+Voodoo, which seems to be a service of the utmost baseness and cruelty.  I
+was told some of his deeds of cruelty, which are simply sickening.  They
+made me long for an opportunity of helping to drive him back to hell.  You
+might think to look at him that you could measure in some way the extent
+of his vileness; but it would be a vain hope.  Monsters such as he is
+belong to an earlier and more rudimentary stage of barbarism.  He is in
+his way a clever fellow--for a nigger; but is none the less dangerous or
+the less hateful for that.  The men in the ship told me that he was a
+collector: some of them had seen his collections.  Such collections!  All
+that was potent for evil in bird or beast, or even in fish.  Beaks that
+could break and rend and tear--all the birds represented were of a
+predatory kind.  Even the fishes are those which are born to destroy, to
+wound, to torture.  The collection, I assure you, was an object lesson in
+human malignity.  This being has enough evil in his face to frighten even
+a strong man.  It is little wonder that the sight of it put that poor
+girl into a dead faint!"
+
+Nothing more could be done at the moment, so they separated.
+
+Adam was up in the early morning and took a smart walk round the Brow.  As
+he was passing Diana's Grove, he looked in on the short avenue of trees,
+and noticed the snakes killed on the previous morning by the mongoose.
+They all lay in a row, straight and rigid, as if they had been placed by
+hands.  Their skins seemed damp and sticky, and they were covered all
+over with ants and other insects.  They looked loathsome, so after a
+glance, he passed on.
+
+A little later, when his steps took him, naturally enough, past the
+entrance to Mercy Farm, he was passed by the negro, moving quickly under
+the trees wherever there was shadow.  Laid across one extended arm,
+looking like dirty towels across a rail, he had the horrid-looking
+snakes.  He did not seem to see Adam.  No one was to be seen at Mercy
+except a few workmen in the farmyard, so, after waiting on the chance of
+seeing Mimi, Adam began to go slowly home.
+
+Once more he was passed on the way.  This time it was by Lady Arabella,
+walking hurriedly and so furiously angry that she did not recognise him,
+even to the extent of acknowledging his bow.
+
+When Adam got back to Lesser Hill, he went to the coach-house where the
+box with the mongoose was kept, and took it with him, intending to finish
+at the Mound of Stone what he had begun the previous morning with regard
+to the extermination.  He found that the snakes were even more easily
+attacked than on the previous day; no less than six were killed in the
+first half-hour.  As no more appeared, he took it for granted that the
+morning's work was over, and went towards home.  The mongoose had by this
+time become accustomed to him, and was willing to let himself be handled
+freely.  Adam lifted him up and put him on his shoulder and walked on.
+Presently he saw a lady advancing towards him, and recognised Lady
+Arabella.
+
+Hitherto the mongoose had been quiet, like a playful affectionate kitten;
+but when the two got close, Adam was horrified to see the mongoose, in a
+state of the wildest fury, with every hair standing on end, jump from his
+shoulder and run towards Lady Arabella.  It looked so furious and so
+intent on attack that he called a warning.
+
+"Look out--look out!  The animal is furious and means to attack."
+
+Lady Arabella looked more than ever disdainful and was passing on; the
+mongoose jumped at her in a furious attack.  Adam rushed forward with his
+stick, the only weapon he had.  But just as he got within striking
+distance, the lady drew out a revolver and shot the animal, breaking his
+backbone.  Not satisfied with this, she poured shot after shot into him
+till the magazine was exhausted.  There was no coolness or hauteur about
+her now; she seemed more furious even than the animal, her face
+transformed with hate, and as determined to kill as he had appeared to
+be.  Adam, not knowing exactly what to do, lifted his hat in apology and
+hurried on to Lesser Hill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII--SURVIVALS
+
+
+At breakfast Sir Nathaniel noticed that Adam was put out about something,
+but he said nothing.  The lesson of silence is better remembered in age
+than in youth.  When they were both in the study, where Sir Nathaniel
+followed him, Adam at once began to tell his companion of what had
+happened.  Sir Nathaniel looked graver and graver as the narration
+proceeded, and when Adam had stopped he remained silent for several
+minutes, before speaking.
+
+"This is very grave.  I have not formed any opinion yet; but it seems to
+me at first impression that this is worse than anything I had expected."
+
+"Why, sir?" said Adam.  "Is the killing of a mongoose--no matter by
+whom--so serious a thing as all that?"
+
+His companion smoked on quietly for quite another few minutes before he
+spoke.
+
+"When I have properly thought it over I may moderate my opinion, but in
+the meantime it seems to me that there is something dreadful behind all
+this--something that may affect all our lives--that may mean the issue of
+life or death to any of us."
+
+Adam sat up quickly.
+
+"Do tell me, sir, what is in your mind--if, of course, you have no
+objection, or do not think it better to withhold it."
+
+"I have no objection, Adam--in fact, if I had, I should have to overcome
+it.  I fear there can be no more reserved thoughts between us."
+
+"Indeed, sir, that sounds serious, worse than serious!"
+
+"Adam, I greatly fear that the time has come for us--for you and me, at
+all events--to speak out plainly to one another.  Does not there seem
+something very mysterious about this?"
+
+"I have thought so, sir, all along.  The only difficulty one has is what
+one is to think and where to begin."
+
+"Let us begin with what you have told me.  First take the conduct of the
+mongoose.  He was quiet, even friendly and affectionate with you.  He
+only attacked the snakes, which is, after all, his business in life."
+
+"That is so!"
+
+"Then we must try to find some reason why he attacked Lady Arabella."
+
+"May it not be that a mongoose may have merely the instinct to attack,
+that nature does not allow or provide him with the fine reasoning powers
+to discriminate who he is to attack?"
+
+"Of course that may be so.  But, on the other hand, should we not satisfy
+ourselves why he does wish to attack anything?  If for centuries, this
+particular animal is known to attack only one kind of other animal, are
+we not justified in assuming that when one of them attacks a hitherto
+unclassed animal, he recognises in that animal some quality which it has
+in common with the hereditary enemy?"
+
+"That is a good argument, sir," Adam went on, "but a dangerous one.  If
+we followed it out, it would lead us to believe that Lady Arabella is a
+snake."
+
+"We must be sure, before going to such an end, that there is no point as
+yet unconsidered which would account for the unknown thing which puzzles
+us."
+
+"In what way?"
+
+"Well, suppose the instinct works on some physical basis--for instance,
+smell.  If there were anything in recent juxtaposition to the attacked
+which would carry the scent, surely that would supply the missing cause."
+
+"Of course!" Adam spoke with conviction.
+
+"Now, from what you tell me, the negro had just come from the direction
+of Diana's Grove, carrying the dead snakes which the mongoose had killed
+the previous morning.  Might not the scent have been carried that way?"
+
+"Of course it might, and probably was.  I never thought of that.  Is
+there any possible way of guessing approximately how long a scent will
+remain?  You see, this is a natural scent, and may derive from a place
+where it has been effective for thousands of years.  Then, does a scent
+of any kind carry with it any form or quality of another kind, either
+good or evil?  I ask you because one ancient name of the house lived in
+by the lady who was attacked by the mongoose was 'The Lair of the White
+Worm.'  If any of these things be so, our difficulties have multiplied
+indefinitely.  They may even change in kind.  We may get into moral
+entanglements; before we know it, we may be in the midst of a struggle
+between good and evil."
+
+Sir Nathaniel smiled gravely.
+
+"With regard to the first question--so far as I know, there are no fixed
+periods for which a scent may be active--I think we may take it that that
+period does not run into thousands of years.  As to whether any moral
+change accompanies a physical one, I can only say that I have met no
+proof of the fact.  At the same time, we must remember that 'good' and
+'evil' are terms so wide as to take in the whole scheme of creation, and
+all that is implied by them and by their mutual action and reaction.
+Generally, I would say that in the scheme of a First Cause anything is
+possible.  So long as the inherent forces or tendencies of any one thing
+are veiled from us we must expect mystery."
+
+"There is one other question on which I should like to ask your opinion.
+Suppose that there are any permanent forces appertaining to the past,
+what we may call 'survivals,' do these belong to good as well as to evil?
+For instance, if the scent of the primaeval monster can so remain in
+proportion to the original strength, can the same be true of things of
+good import?"
+
+Sir Nathaniel thought for a while before he answered.
+
+"We must be careful not to confuse the physical and the moral.  I can see
+that already you have switched on the moral entirely, so perhaps we had
+better follow it up first.  On the side of the moral, we have certain
+justification for belief in the utterances of revealed religion.  For
+instance, 'the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much'
+is altogether for good.  We have nothing of a similar kind on the side of
+evil.  But if we accept this dictum we need have no more fear of
+'mysteries': these become thenceforth merely obstacles."
+
+Adam suddenly changed to another phase of the subject.
+
+"And now, sir, may I turn for a few minutes to purely practical things,
+or rather to matters of historical fact?"
+
+Sir Nathaniel bowed acquiescence.
+
+"We have already spoken of the history, so far as it is known, of some of
+the places round us--'Castra Regis,' 'Diana's Grove,' and 'The Lair of
+the White Worm.'  I would like to ask if there is anything not
+necessarily of evil import about any of the places?"
+
+"Which?" asked Sir Nathaniel shrewdly.
+
+"Well, for instance, this house and Mercy Farm?"
+
+"Here we turn," said Sir Nathaniel, "to the other side, the light side of
+things.  Let us take Mercy Farm first.  When Augustine was sent by Pope
+Gregory to Christianise England, in the time of the Romans, he was
+received and protected by Ethelbert, King of Kent, whose wife, daughter
+of Charibert, King of Paris, was a Christian, and did much for Augustine.
+She founded a nunnery in memory of Columba, which was named _Sedes
+misericordioe_, the House of Mercy, and, as the region was Mercian, the
+two names became involved.  As Columba is the Latin for dove, the dove
+became a sort of signification of the nunnery.  She seized on the idea
+and made the newly-founded nunnery a house of doves.  Someone sent her a
+freshly-discovered dove, a sort of carrier, but which had in the white
+feathers of its head and neck the form of a religious cowl.  The nunnery
+flourished for more than a century, when, in the time of Penda, who was
+the reactionary of heathendom, it fell into decay.  In the meantime the
+doves, protected by religious feeling, had increased mightily, and were
+known in all Catholic communities.  When King Offa ruled in Mercia, about
+a hundred and fifty years later, he restored Christianity, and under its
+protection the nunnery of St. Columba was restored and its doves
+flourished again.  In process of time this religious house again fell
+into desuetude; but before it disappeared it had achieved a great name
+for good works, and in especial for the piety of its members.  If deeds
+and prayers and hopes and earnest thinking leave anywhere any moral
+effect, Mercy Farm and all around it have almost the right to be
+considered holy ground."
+
+"Thank you, sir," said Adam earnestly, and was silent.  Sir Nathaniel
+understood.
+
+After lunch that day, Adam casually asked Sir Nathaniel to come for a
+walk with him.  The keen-witted old diplomatist guessed that there must
+be some motive behind the suggestion, and he at once agreed.
+
+As soon as they were free from observation, Adam began.
+
+"I am afraid, sir, that there is more going on in this neighbourhood than
+most people imagine.  I was out this morning, and on the edge of the
+small wood, I came upon the body of a child by the roadside.  At first, I
+thought she was dead, and while examining her, I noticed on her neck some
+marks that looked like those of teeth."
+
+"Some wild dog, perhaps?" put in Sir Nathaniel.
+
+"Possibly, sir, though I think not--but listen to the rest of my news.  I
+glanced around, and to my surprise, I noticed something white moving
+among the trees.  I placed the child down carefully, and followed, but I
+could not find any further traces.  So I returned to the child and
+resumed my examination, and, to my delight, I discovered that she was
+still alive.  I chafed her hands and gradually she revived, but to my
+disappointment she remembered nothing--except that something had crept up
+quietly from behind, and had gripped her round the throat.  Then,
+apparently, she fainted."
+
+"Gripped her round the throat!  Then it cannot have been a dog."
+
+"No, sir, that is my difficulty, and explains why I brought you out here,
+where we cannot possibly be overheard.  You have noticed, of course, the
+peculiar sinuous way in which Lady Arabella moves--well, I feel certain
+that the white thing that I saw in the wood was the mistress of Diana's
+Grove!"
+
+"Good God, boy, be careful what you say."
+
+"Yes, sir, I fully realise the gravity of my accusation, but I feel
+convinced that the marks on the child's throat were human--and made by a
+woman."
+
+Adam's companion remained silent for some time, deep in thought.
+
+"Adam, my boy," he said at last, "this matter appears to me to be far
+more serious even than you think.  It forces me to break confidence with
+my old friend, your uncle--but, in order to spare him, I must do so.  For
+some time now, things have been happening in this district that have been
+worrying him dreadfully--several people have disappeared, without leaving
+the slightest trace; a dead child was found by the roadside, with no
+visible or ascertainable cause of death--sheep and other animals have
+been found in the fields, bleeding from open wounds.  There have been
+other matters--many of them apparently trivial in themselves.  Some
+sinister influence has been at work, and I admit that I have suspected
+Lady Arabella--that is why I questioned you so closely about the mongoose
+and its strange attack upon Lady Arabella.  You will think it strange
+that I should suspect the mistress of Diana's Grove, a beautiful woman of
+aristocratic birth.  Let me explain--the family seat is near my own
+place, Doom Tower, and at one time I knew the family well.  When still a
+young girl, Lady Arabella wandered into a small wood near her home, and
+did not return.  She was found unconscious and in a high fever--the
+doctor said that she had received a poisonous bite, and the girl being at
+a delicate and critical age, the result was serious--so much so that she
+was not expected to recover.  A great London physician came down but
+could do nothing--indeed, he said that the girl would not survive the
+night.  All hope had been abandoned, when, to everyone's surprise, Lady
+Arabella made a sudden and startling recovery.  Within a couple of days
+she was going about as usual!  But to the horror of her people, she
+developed a terrible craving for cruelty, maiming and injuring birds and
+small animals--even killing them.  This was put down to a nervous
+disturbance due to her age, and it was hoped that her marriage to Captain
+March would put this right.  However, it was not a happy marriage, and
+eventually her husband was found shot through the head.  I have always
+suspected suicide, though no pistol was found near the body.  He may have
+discovered something--God knows what!--so possibly Lady Arabella may
+herself have killed him.  Putting together many small matters that have
+come to my knowledge, I have come to the conclusion that the foul White
+Worm obtained control of her body, just as her soul was leaving its
+earthly tenement--that would explain the sudden revival of energy, the
+strange and inexplicable craving for maiming and killing, as well as many
+other matters with which I need not trouble you now, Adam.  As I said
+just now, God alone knows what poor Captain March discovered--it must
+have been something too ghastly for human endurance, if my theory is
+correct that the once beautiful human body of Lady Arabella is under the
+control of this ghastly White Worm."
+
+Adam nodded.
+
+"But what can we do, sir--it seems a most difficult problem."
+
+"We can do nothing, my boy--that is the important part of it.  It would
+be impossible to take action--all we can do is to keep careful watch,
+especially as regards Lady Arabella, and be ready to act, promptly and
+decisively, if the opportunity occurs."
+
+Adam agreed, and the two men returned to Lesser Hill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX--SMELLING DEATH
+
+
+Adam Salton, though he talked little, did not let the grass grow under
+his feet in any matter which he had undertaken, or in which he was
+interested.  He had agreed with Sir Nathaniel that they should not do
+anything with regard to the mystery of Lady Arabella's fear of the
+mongoose, but he steadily pursued his course in being _prepared_ to act
+whenever the opportunity might come.  He was in his own mind perpetually
+casting about for information or clues which might lead to possible lines
+of action.  Baffled by the killing of the mongoose, he looked around for
+another line to follow.  He was fascinated by the idea of there being a
+mysterious link between the woman and the animal, but he was already
+preparing a second string to his bow.  His new idea was to use the
+faculties of Oolanga, so far as he could, in the service of discovery.
+His first move was to send Davenport to Liverpool to try to find the
+steward of the _West African_, who had told him about Oolanga, and if
+possible secure any further information, and then try to induce (by
+bribery or other means) the nigger to come to the Brow.  So soon as he
+himself could have speech of the Voodoo-man he would be able to learn
+from him something useful.  Davenport was successful in his missions, for
+he had to get another mongoose, and he was able to tell Adam that he had
+seen the steward, who told him much that he wanted to know, and had also
+arranged for Oolanga to come to Lesser Hill the following day.  At this
+point Adam saw his way sufficiently clear to admit Davenport to some
+extent into his confidence.  He had come to the conclusion that it would
+be better--certainly at first--not himself to appear in the matter, with
+which Davenport was fully competent to deal.  It would be time for
+himself to take a personal part when matters had advanced a little
+further.
+
+If what the nigger said was in any wise true, the man had a rare gift
+which might be useful in the quest they were after.  He could, as it
+were, "smell death."  If any one was dead, if any one had died, or if a
+place had been used in connection with death, he seemed to know the broad
+fact by intuition.  Adam made up his mind that to test this faculty with
+regard to several places would be his first task.  Naturally he was
+anxious, and the time passed slowly.  The only comfort was the arrival
+the next morning of a strong packing case, locked, from Ross, the key
+being in the custody of Davenport.  In the case were two smaller boxes,
+both locked.  One of them contained a mongoose to replace that killed by
+Lady Arabella; the other was the special mongoose which had already
+killed the king-cobra in Nepaul.  When both the animals had been safely
+put under lock and key, he felt that he might breathe more freely.  No
+one was allowed to know the secret of their existence in the house,
+except himself and Davenport.  He arranged that Davenport should take
+Oolanga round the neighbourhood for a walk, stopping at each of the
+places which he designated.  Having gone all along the Brow, he was to
+return the same way and induce him to touch on the same subjects in
+talking with Adam, who was to meet them as if by chance at the farthest
+part--that beyond Mercy Farm.
+
+The incidents of the day proved much as Adam expected.  At Mercy Farm, at
+Diana's Grove, at Castra Regis, and a few other spots, the negro stopped
+and, opening his wide nostrils as if to sniff boldly, said that he
+smelled death.  It was not always in the same form.  At Mercy Farm he
+said there were many small deaths.  At Diana's Grove his bearing was
+different.  There was a distinct sense of enjoyment about him, especially
+when he spoke of many great deaths.  Here, too, he sniffed in a strange
+way, like a bloodhound at check, and looked puzzled.  He said no word in
+either praise or disparagement, but in the centre of the Grove, where,
+hidden amongst ancient oak stumps, was a block of granite slightly
+hollowed on the top, he bent low and placed his forehead on the ground.
+This was the only place where he showed distinct reverence.  At the
+Castle, though he spoke of much death, he showed no sign of respect.
+
+There was evidently something about Diana's Grove which both interested
+and baffled him.  Before leaving, he moved all over the place
+unsatisfied, and in one spot, close to the edge of the Brow, where there
+was a deep hollow, he appeared to be afraid.  After returning several
+times to this place, he suddenly turned and ran in a panic of fear to the
+higher ground, crossing as he did so the outcropping rock.  Then he
+seemed to breathe more freely, and recovered some of his jaunty
+impudence.
+
+All this seemed to satisfy Adam's expectations.  He went back to Lesser
+Hill with a serene and settled calm upon him.  Sir Nathaniel followed him
+into his study.
+
+"By the way, I forgot to ask you details about one thing.  When that
+extraordinary staring episode of Mr. Caswall went on, how did Lilla take
+it--how did she bear herself?"
+
+"She looked frightened, and trembled just as I have seen a pigeon with a
+hawk, or a bird with a serpent."
+
+"Thanks.  It is just as I expected.  There have been circumstances in the
+Caswall family which lead one to believe that they have had from the
+earliest times some extraordinary mesmeric or hypnotic faculty.  Indeed,
+a skilled eye could read so much in their physiognomy.  That shot of
+yours, whether by instinct or intention, of the hawk and the pigeon was
+peculiarly apposite.  I think we may settle on that as a fixed trait to
+be accepted throughout our investigation."
+
+When dusk had fallen, Adam took the new mongoose--not the one from
+Nepaul--and, carrying the box slung over his shoulder, strolled towards
+Diana's Grove.  Close to the gateway he met Lady Arabella, clad as usual
+in tightly fitting white, which showed off her slim figure.
+
+To his intense astonishment the mongoose allowed her to pet him, take him
+up in her arms and fondle him.  As she was going in his direction, they
+walked on together.
+
+Round the roadway between the entrances of Diana's Grove and Lesser Hill
+were many trees, with not much foliage except at the top.  In the dusk
+this place was shadowy, and the view was hampered by the clustering
+trunks.  In the uncertain, tremulous light which fell through the tree-
+tops, it was hard to distinguish anything clearly, and at last, somehow,
+he lost sight of her altogether, and turned back on his track to find
+her.  Presently he came across her close to her own gate.  She was
+leaning over the paling of split oak branches which formed the paling of
+the avenue.  He could not see the mongoose, so he asked her where it had
+gone.
+
+"He slipt out of my arms while I was petting him," she answered, "and
+disappeared under the hedges."
+
+They found him at a place where the avenue widened so as to let carriages
+pass each other.  The little creature seemed quite changed.  He had been
+ebulliently active; now he was dull and spiritless--seemed to be dazed.
+He allowed himself to be lifted by either of the pair; but when he was
+alone with Lady Arabella he kept looking round him in a strange way, as
+though trying to escape.  When they had come out on the roadway Adam held
+the mongoose tight to him, and, lifting his hat to his companion, moved
+quickly towards Lesser Hill; he and Lady Arabella lost sight of each
+other in the thickening gloom.
+
+When Adam got home, he put the mongoose in his box, and locked the door
+of the room.  The other mongoose--the one from Nepaul--was safely locked
+in his own box, but he lay quiet and did not stir.  When he got to his
+study Sir Nathaniel came in, shutting the door behind him.
+
+"I have come," he said, "while we have an opportunity of being alone, to
+tell you something of the Caswall family which I think will interest you.
+There is, or used to be, a belief in this part of the world that the
+Caswall family had some strange power of making the wills of other
+persons subservient to their own.  There are many allusions to the
+subject in memoirs and other unimportant works, but I only know of one
+where the subject is spoken of definitely.  It is _Mercia and its
+Worthies_, written by Ezra Toms more than a hundred years ago.  The
+author goes into the question of the close association of the then Edgar
+Caswall with Mesmer in Paris.  He speaks of Caswall being a pupil and the
+fellow worker of Mesmer, and states that though, when the latter left
+France, he took away with him a vast quantity of philosophical and
+electric instruments, he was never known to use them again.  He once made
+it known to a friend that he had given them to his old pupil.  The term
+he used was odd, for it was 'bequeathed,' but no such bequest of Mesmer
+was ever made known.  At any rate the instruments were missing, and never
+turned up."
+
+A servant came into the room to tell Adam that there was some strange
+noise coming from the locked room into which he had gone when he came in.
+He hurried off to the place at once, Sir Nathaniel going with him.  Having
+locked the door behind them, Adam opened the packing-case where the boxes
+of the two mongooses were locked up.  There was no sound from one of
+them, but from the other a queer restless struggling.  Having opened both
+boxes, he found that the noise was from the Nepaul animal, which,
+however, became quiet at once.  In the other box the new mongoose lay
+dead, with every appearance of having been strangled!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X--THE KITE
+
+
+On the following day, a little after four o'clock, Adam set out for
+Mercy.
+
+He was home just as the clocks were striking six.  He was pale and upset,
+but otherwise looked strong and alert.  The old man summed up his
+appearance and manner thus: "Braced up for battle."
+
+"Now!" said Sir Nathaniel, and settled down to listen, looking at Adam
+steadily and listening attentively that he might miss nothing--even the
+inflection of a word.
+
+"I found Lilla and Mimi at home.  Watford had been detained by business
+on the farm.  Miss Watford received me as kindly as before; Mimi, too,
+seemed glad to see me.  Mr. Caswall came so soon after I arrived, that
+he, or someone on his behalf, must have been watching for me.  He was
+followed closely by the negro, who was puffing hard as if he had been
+running--so it was probably he who watched.  Mr. Caswall was very cool
+and collected, but there was a more than usually iron look about his face
+that I did not like.  However, we got on very well.  He talked pleasantly
+on all sorts of questions.  The nigger waited a while and then
+disappeared as on the other occasion.  Mr. Caswall's eyes were as usual
+fixed on Lilla.  True, they seemed to be very deep and earnest, but there
+was no offence in them.  Had it not been for the drawing down of the
+brows and the stern set of the jaws, I should not at first have noticed
+anything.  But the stare, when presently it began, increased in
+intensity.  I could see that Lilla began to suffer from nervousness, as
+on the first occasion; but she carried herself bravely.  However, the
+more nervous she grew, the harder Mr. Caswall stared.  It was evident to
+me that he had come prepared for some sort of mesmeric or hypnotic
+battle.  After a while he began to throw glances round him and then
+raised his hand, without letting either Lilla or Mimi see the action.  It
+was evidently intended to give some sign to the negro, for he came, in
+his usual stealthy way, quietly in by the hall door, which was open.  Then
+Mr. Caswall's efforts at staring became intensified, and poor Lilla's
+nervousness grew greater.  Mimi, seeing that her cousin was distressed,
+came close to her, as if to comfort or strengthen her with the
+consciousness of her presence.  This evidently made a difficulty for Mr.
+Caswall, for his efforts, without appearing to get feebler, seemed less
+effective.  This continued for a little while, to the gain of both Lilla
+and Mimi.  Then there was a diversion.  Without word or apology the door
+opened, and Lady Arabella March entered the room.  I had seen her coming
+through the great window.  Without a word she crossed the room and stood
+beside Mr. Caswall.  It really was very like a fight of a peculiar kind;
+and the longer it was sustained the more earnest--the fiercer--it grew.
+That combination of forces--the over-lord, the white woman, and the black
+man--would have cost some--probably all of them--their lives in the
+Southern States of America.  To us it was simply horrible.  But all that
+you can understand.  This time, to go on in sporting phrase, it was
+understood by all to be a 'fight to a finish,' and the mixed group did
+not slacken a moment or relax their efforts.  On Lilla the strain began
+to tell disastrously.  She grew pale--a patchy pallor, which meant that
+her nerves were out of order.  She trembled like an aspen, and though she
+struggled bravely, I noticed that her legs would hardly support her.  A
+dozen times she seemed about to collapse in a faint, but each time, on
+catching sight of Mimi's eyes, she made a fresh struggle and pulled
+through.
+
+"By now Mr. Caswall's face had lost its appearance of passivity.  His
+eyes glowed with a fiery light.  He was still the old Roman in
+inflexibility of purpose; but grafted on to the Roman was a new Berserker
+fury.  His companions in the baleful work seemed to have taken on
+something of his feeling.  Lady Arabella looked like a soulless, pitiless
+being, not human, unless it revived old legends of transformed human
+beings who had lost their humanity in some transformation or in the sweep
+of natural savagery.  As for the negro--well, I can only say that it was
+solely due to the self-restraint which you impressed on me that I did not
+wipe him out as he stood--without warning, without fair play--without a
+single one of the graces of life and death.  Lilla was silent in the
+helpless concentration of deadly fear; Mimi was all resolve and
+self-forgetfulness, so intent on the soul-struggle in which she was
+engaged that there was no possibility of any other thought.  As for
+myself, the bonds of will which held me inactive seemed like bands of
+steel which numbed all my faculties, except sight and hearing.  We seemed
+fixed in an _impasse_.  Something must happen, though the power of
+guessing was inactive.  As in a dream, I saw Mimi's hand move restlessly,
+as if groping for something.  Mechanically it touched that of Lilla, and
+in that instant she was transformed.  It was as if youth and strength
+entered afresh into something already dead to sensibility and intention.
+As if by inspiration, she grasped the other's band with a force which
+blenched the knuckles.  Her face suddenly flamed, as if some divine light
+shone through it.  Her form expanded till it stood out majestically.
+Lifting her right hand, she stepped forward towards Caswall, and with a
+bold sweep of her arm seemed to drive some strange force towards him.
+Again and again was the gesture repeated, the man falling back from her
+at each movement.  Towards the door he retreated, she following.  There
+was a sound as of the cooing sob of doves, which seemed to multiply and
+intensify with each second.  The sound from the unseen source rose and
+rose as he retreated, till finally it swelled out in a triumphant peal,
+as she with a fierce sweep of her arm, seemed to hurl something at her
+foe, and he, moving his hands blindly before his face, appeared to be
+swept through the doorway and out into the open sunlight.
+
+"All at once my own faculties were fully restored; I could see and hear
+everything, and be fully conscious of what was going on.  Even the
+figures of the baleful group were there, though dimly seen as through a
+veil--a shadowy veil.  I saw Lilla sink down in a swoon, and Mimi throw
+up her arms in a gesture of triumph.  As I saw her through the great
+window, the sunshine flooded the landscape, which, however, was
+momentarily becoming eclipsed by an onrush of a myriad birds."
+
+By the next morning, daylight showed the actual danger which threatened.
+From every part of the eastern counties reports were received concerning
+the enormous immigration of birds.  Experts were sending--on their own
+account, on behalf of learned societies, and through local and imperial
+governing bodies--reports dealing with the matter, and suggesting
+remedies.
+
+The reports closer to home were even more disturbing.  All day long it
+would seem that the birds were coming thicker from all quarters.
+Doubtless many were going as well as coming, but the mass seemed never to
+get less.  Each bird seemed to sound some note of fear or anger or
+seeking, and the whirring of wings never ceased nor lessened.  The air
+was full of a muttered throb.  No window or barrier could shut out the
+sound, till the ears of any listener became dulled by the ceaseless
+murmur.  So monotonous it was, so cheerless, so disheartening, so
+melancholy, that all longed, but in vain, for any variety, no matter how
+terrible it might be.
+
+The second morning the reports from all the districts round were more
+alarming than ever.  Farmers began to dread the coming of winter as they
+saw the dwindling of the timely fruitfulness of the earth.  And as yet it
+was only a warning of evil, not the evil accomplished; the ground began
+to look bare whenever some passing sound temporarily frightened the
+birds.
+
+Edgar Caswall tortured his brain for a long time unavailingly, to think
+of some means of getting rid of what he, as well as his neighbours, had
+come to regard as a plague of birds.  At last he recalled a circumstance
+which promised a solution of the difficulty.  The experience was of some
+years ago in China, far up-country, towards the head-waters of the Yang-
+tze-kiang, where the smaller tributaries spread out in a sort of natural
+irrigation scheme to supply the wilderness of paddy-fields.  It was at
+the time of the ripening rice, and the myriads of birds which came to
+feed on the coming crop was a serious menace, not only to the district,
+but to the country at large.  The farmers, who were more or less
+afflicted with the same trouble every season, knew how to deal with it.
+They made a vast kite, which they caused to be flown over the centre spot
+of the incursion.  The kite was shaped like a great hawk; and the moment
+it rose into the air the birds began to cower and seek protection--and
+then to disappear.  So long as that kite was flying overhead the birds
+lay low and the crop was saved.  Accordingly Caswall ordered his men to
+construct an immense kite, adhering as well as they could to the lines of
+a hawk.  Then he and his men, with a sufficiency of cord, began to fly it
+high overhead.  The experience of China was repeated.  The moment the
+kite rose, the birds hid or sought shelter.  The following morning, the
+kite was still flying high, no bird was to be seen as far as the eye
+could reach from Castra Regis.  But there followed in turn what proved
+even a worse evil.  All the birds were cowed; their sounds stopped.
+Neither song nor chirp was heard--silence seemed to have taken the place
+of the normal voices of bird life.  But that was not all.  The silence
+spread to all animals.
+
+The fear and restraint which brooded amongst the denizens of the air
+began to affect all life.  Not only did the birds cease song or chirp,
+but the lowing of the cattle ceased in the fields and the varied sounds
+of life died away.  In place of these things was only a soundless gloom,
+more dreadful, more disheartening, more soul-killing than any concourse
+of sounds, no matter how full of fear and dread.  Pious individuals put
+up constant prayers for relief from the intolerable solitude.  After a
+little there were signs of universal depression which those who ran might
+read.  One and all, the faces of men and women seemed bereft of vitality,
+of interest, of thought, and, most of all, of hope.  Men seemed to have
+lost the power of expression of their thoughts.  The soundless air seemed
+to have the same effect as the universal darkness when men gnawed their
+tongues with pain.
+
+From this infliction of silence there was no relief.  Everything was
+affected; gloom was the predominant note.  Joy appeared to have passed
+away as a factor of life, and this creative impulse had nothing to take
+its place.  That giant spot in high air was a plague of evil influence.
+It seemed like a new misanthropic belief which had fallen on human
+beings, carrying with it the negation of all hope.
+
+After a few days, men began to grow desperate; their very words as well
+as their senses seemed to be in chains.  Edgar Caswall again tortured his
+brain to find any antidote or palliative of this greater evil than
+before.  He would gladly have destroyed the kite, or caused its flying to
+cease; but the instant it was pulled down, the birds rose up in even
+greater numbers; all those who depended in any way on agriculture sent
+pitiful protests to Castra Regis.
+
+It was strange indeed what influence that weird kite seemed to exercise.
+Even human beings were affected by it, as if both it and they were
+realities.  As for the people at Mercy Farm, it was like a taste of
+actual death.  Lilla felt it most.  If she had been indeed a real dove,
+with a real kite hanging over her in the air, she could not have been
+more frightened or more affected by the terror this created.
+
+Of course, some of those already drawn into the vortex noticed the effect
+on individuals.  Those who were interested took care to compare their
+information.  Strangely enough, as it seemed to the others, the person
+who took the ghastly silence least to heart was the negro.  By nature he
+was not sensitive to, or afflicted by, nerves.  This alone would not have
+produced the seeming indifference, so they set their minds to discover
+the real cause.  Adam came quickly to the conclusion that there was for
+him some compensation that the others did not share; and he soon believed
+that that compensation was in one form or another the enjoyment of the
+sufferings of others.  Thus the black had a never-failing source of
+amusement.
+
+Lady Arabella's cold nature rendered her immune to anything in the way of
+pain or trouble concerning others.  Edgar Caswall was far too haughty a
+person, and too stern of nature, to concern himself about poor or
+helpless people, much less the lower order of mere animals.  Mr. Watford,
+Mr. Salton, and Sir Nathaniel were all concerned in the issue, partly
+from kindness of heart--for none of them could see suffering, even of
+wild birds, unmoved--and partly on account of their property, which had
+to be protected, or ruin would stare them in the face before long.
+
+Lilla suffered acutely.  As time went on, her face became pinched, and
+her eyes dull with watching and crying.  Mimi suffered too on account of
+her cousin's suffering.  But as she could do nothing, she resolutely made
+up her mind to self-restraint and patience.  Adam's frequent visits
+comforted her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI--MESMER'S CHEST
+
+
+After a couple of weeks had passed, the kite seemed to give Edgar Caswall
+a new zest for life.  He was never tired of looking at its movements.  He
+had a comfortable armchair put out on the tower, wherein he sat sometimes
+all day long, watching as though the kite was a new toy and he a child
+lately come into possession of it.  He did not seem to have lost interest
+in Lilla, for he still paid an occasional visit at Mercy Farm.
+
+Indeed, his feeling towards her, whatever it had been at first, had now
+so far changed that it had become a distinct affection of a purely animal
+kind.  Indeed, it seemed as though the man's nature had become corrupted,
+and that all the baser and more selfish and more reckless qualities had
+become more conspicuous.  There was not so much sternness apparent in his
+nature, because there was less self-restraint.  Determination had become
+indifference.
+
+The visible change in Edgar was that he grew morbid, sad, silent; the
+neighbours thought he was going mad.  He became absorbed in the kite, and
+watched it not only by day, but often all night long.  It became an
+obsession to him.
+
+Caswall took a personal interest in the keeping of the great kite flying.
+He had a vast coil of cord efficient for the purpose, which worked on a
+roller fixed on the parapet of the tower.  There was a winch for the
+pulling in of the slack; the outgoing line being controlled by a racket.
+There was invariably one man at least, day and night, on the tower to
+attend to it.  At such an elevation there was always a strong wind, and
+at times the kite rose to an enormous height, as well as travelling for
+great distances laterally.  In fact, the kite became, in a short time,
+one of the curiosities of Castra Regis and all around it.  Edgar began to
+attribute to it, in his own mind, almost human qualities.  It became to
+him a separate entity, with a mind and a soul of its own.  Being idle-
+handed all day, he began to apply to what he considered the service of
+the kite some of his spare time, and found a new pleasure--a new object
+in life--in the old schoolboy game of sending up "runners" to the kite.
+The way this is done is to get round pieces of paper so cut that there is
+a hole in the centre, through which the string of the kite passes.  The
+natural action of the wind-pressure takes the paper along the string, and
+so up to the kite itself, no matter how high or how far it may have gone.
+
+In the early days of this amusement Edgar Caswall spent hours.  Hundreds
+of such messengers flew along the string, until soon he bethought him of
+writing messages on these papers so that he could make known his ideas to
+the kite.  It may be that his brain gave way under the opportunities
+given by his illusion of the entity of the toy and its power of separate
+thought.  From sending messages he came to making direct speech to the
+kite--without, however, ceasing to send the runners.  Doubtless, the
+height of the tower, seated as it was on the hill-top, the rushing of the
+ceaseless wind, the hypnotic effect of the lofty altitude of the speck in
+the sky at which he gazed, and the rushing of the paper messengers up the
+string till sight of them was lost in distance, all helped to further
+affect his brain, undoubtedly giving way under the strain of beliefs and
+circumstances which were at once stimulating to the imagination,
+occupative of his mind, and absorbing.
+
+The next step of intellectual decline was to bring to bear on the main
+idea of the conscious identity of the kite all sorts of subjects which
+had imaginative force or tendency of their own.  He had, in Castra Regis,
+a large collection of curious and interesting things formed in the past
+by his forebears, of similar tastes to his own.  There were all sorts of
+strange anthropological specimens, both old and new, which had been
+collected through various travels in strange places: ancient Egyptian
+relics from tombs and mummies; curios from Australia, New Zealand, and
+the South Seas; idols and images--from Tartar ikons to ancient Egyptian,
+Persian, and Indian objects of worship; objects of death and torture of
+American Indians; and, above all, a vast collection of lethal weapons of
+every kind and from every place--Chinese "high pinders," double knives,
+Afghan double-edged scimitars made to cut a body in two, heavy knives
+from all the Eastern countries, ghost daggers from Thibet, the terrible
+kukri of the Ghourka and other hill tribes of India, assassins' weapons
+from Italy and Spain, even the knife which was formerly carried by the
+slave-drivers of the Mississippi region.  Death and pain of every kind
+were fully represented in that gruesome collection.
+
+That it had a fascination for Oolanga goes without saying.  He was never
+tired of visiting the museum in the tower, and spent endless hours in
+inspecting the exhibits, till he was thoroughly familiar with every
+detail of all of them.  He asked permission to clean and polish and
+sharpen them--a favour which was readily granted.  In addition to the
+above objects, there were many things of a kind to awaken human fear.
+Stuffed serpents of the most objectionable and horrid kind; giant insects
+from the tropics, fearsome in every detail; fishes and crustaceans
+covered with weird spikes; dried octopuses of great size.  Other things,
+too, there were, not less deadly though seemingly innocuous--dried fungi,
+traps intended for birds, beasts, fishes, reptiles, and insects; machines
+which could produce pain of any kind and degree, and the only mercy of
+which was the power of producing speedy death.
+
+Caswall, who had never before seen any of these things, except those
+which he had collected himself, found a constant amusement and interest
+in them.  He studied them, their uses, their mechanism--where there was
+such--and their places of origin, until he had an ample and real
+knowledge of all concerning them.  Many were secret and intricate, but he
+never rested till he found out all the secrets.  When once he had become
+interested in strange objects, and the way to use them, he began to
+explore various likely places for similar finds.  He began to inquire of
+his household where strange lumber was kept.  Several of the men spoke of
+old Simon Chester as one who knew everything in and about the house.
+Accordingly, he sent for the old man, who came at once.  He was very old,
+nearly ninety years of age, and very infirm.  He had been born in the
+Castle, and had served its succession of masters--present or absent--ever
+since.  When Edgar began to question him on the subject regarding which
+he had sent for him, old Simon exhibited much perturbation.  In fact, he
+became so frightened that his master, fully believing that he was
+concealing something, ordered him to tell at once what remained unseen,
+and where it was hidden away.  Face to face with discovery of his secret,
+the old man, in a pitiable state of concern, spoke out even more fully
+than Mr. Caswall had expected.
+
+"Indeed, indeed, sir, everything is here in the tower that has ever been
+put away in my time except--except--" here he began to shake and tremble
+it--"except the chest which Mr. Edgar--he who was Mr. Edgar when I first
+took service--brought back from France, after he had been with Dr.
+Mesmer.  The trunk has been kept in my room for safety; but I shall send
+it down here now."
+
+"What is in it?" asked Edgar sharply.
+
+"That I do not know.  Moreover, it is a peculiar trunk, without any
+visible means of opening."
+
+"Is there no lock?"
+
+"I suppose so, sir; but I do not know.  There is no keyhole."
+
+"Send it here; and then come to me yourself."
+
+The trunk, a heavy one with steel bands round it, but no lock or keyhole,
+was carried in by two men.  Shortly afterwards old Simon attended his
+master.  When he came into the room, Mr. Caswall himself went and closed
+the door; then he asked:
+
+"How do you open it?"
+
+"I do not know, sir."
+
+"Do you mean to say that you never opened it?"
+
+"Most certainly I say so, your honour.  How could I?  It was entrusted to
+me with the other things by my master.  To open it would have been a
+breach of trust."
+
+Caswall sneered.
+
+"Quite remarkable!  Leave it with me.  Close the door behind you.
+Stay--did no one ever tell you about it--say anything regarding it--make
+any remark?"
+
+Old Simon turned pale, and put his trembling hands together.
+
+"Oh, sir, I entreat you not to touch it.  That trunk probably contains
+secrets which Dr. Mesmer told my master.  Told them to his ruin!"
+
+"How do you mean?  What ruin?"
+
+"Sir, he it was who, men said, sold his soul to the Evil One; I had
+thought that that time and the evil of it had all passed away."
+
+"That will do.  Go away; but remain in your own room, or within call.  I
+may want you."
+
+The old man bowed deeply and went out trembling, but without speaking a
+word.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII--THE CHEST OPENED
+
+
+Left alone in the turret-room, Edgar Caswall carefully locked the door
+and hung a handkerchief over the keyhole.  Next, he inspected the
+windows, and saw that they were not overlooked from any angle of the main
+building.  Then he carefully examined the trunk, going over it with a
+magnifying glass.  He found it intact: the steel bands were flawless; the
+whole trunk was compact.  After sitting opposite to it for some time, and
+the shades of evening beginning to melt into darkness, he gave up the
+task and went to his bedroom, after locking the door of the turret-room
+behind him and taking away the key.
+
+He woke in the morning at daylight, and resumed his patient but
+unavailing study of the metal trunk.  This he continued during the whole
+day with the same result--humiliating disappointment, which overwrought
+his nerves and made his head ache.  The result of the long strain was
+seen later in the afternoon, when he sat locked within the turret-room
+before the still baffling trunk, distrait, listless and yet agitated,
+sunk in a settled gloom.  As the dusk was falling he told the steward to
+send him two men, strong ones.  These he ordered to take the trunk to his
+bedroom.  In that room he then sat on into the night, without pausing
+even to take any food.  His mind was in a whirl, a fever of excitement.
+The result was that when, late in the night, he locked himself in his
+room his brain was full of odd fancies; he was on the high road to mental
+disturbance.  He lay down on his bed in the dark, still brooding over the
+mystery of the closed trunk.
+
+Gradually he yielded to the influences of silence and darkness.  After
+lying there quietly for some time, his mind became active again.  But
+this time there were round him no disturbing influences; his brain was
+active and able to work freely and to deal with memory.  A thousand
+forgotten--or only half-known--incidents, fragments of conversations or
+theories long ago guessed at and long forgotten, crowded on his mind.  He
+seemed to hear again around him the legions of whirring wings to which he
+had been so lately accustomed.  Even to himself he knew that that was an
+effort of imagination founded on imperfect memory.  But he was content
+that imagination should work, for out of it might come some solution of
+the mystery which surrounded him.  And in this frame of mind, sleep made
+another and more successful essay.  This time he enjoyed peaceful
+slumber, restful alike to his wearied body and his overwrought brain.
+
+In his sleep he arose, and, as if in obedience to some influence beyond
+and greater than himself, lifted the great trunk and set it on a strong
+table at one side of the room, from which he had previously removed a
+quantity of books.  To do this, he had to use an amount of strength which
+was, he knew, far beyond him in his normal state.  As it was, it seemed
+easy enough; everything yielded before his touch.  Then he became
+conscious that somehow--how, he never could remember--the chest was open.
+He unlocked his door, and, taking the chest on his shoulder, carried it
+up to the turret-room, the door of which also he unlocked.  Even at the
+time he was amazed at his own strength, and wondered whence it had come.
+His mind, lost in conjecture, was too far off to realise more immediate
+things.  He knew that the chest was enormously heavy.  He seemed, in a
+sort of vision which lit up the absolute blackness around, to see the two
+sturdy servant men staggering under its great weight.  He locked himself
+again in the turret-room, and laid the opened chest on a table, and in
+the darkness began to unpack it, laying out the contents, which were
+mainly of metal and glass--great pieces in strange forms--on another
+table.  He was conscious of being still asleep, and of acting rather in
+obedience to some unseen and unknown command than in accordance with any
+reasonable plan, to be followed by results which he understood.  This
+phase completed, he proceeded to arrange in order the component parts of
+some large instruments, formed mostly of glass.  His fingers seemed to
+have acquired a new and exquisite subtlety and even a volition of their
+own.  Then weariness of brain came upon him; his head sank down on his
+breast, and little by little everything became wrapped in gloom.
+
+He awoke in the early morning in his bedroom, and looked around him, now
+clear-headed, in amazement.  In its usual place on the strong table stood
+the great steel-hooped chest without lock or key.  But it was now locked.
+He arose quietly and stole to the turret-room.  There everything was as
+it had been on the previous evening.  He looked out of the window where
+high in air flew, as usual, the giant kite.  He unlocked the wicket gate
+of the turret stair and went out on the roof.  Close to him was the great
+coil of cord on its reel.  It was humming in the morning breeze, and when
+he touched the string it sent a quick thrill through hand and arm.  There
+was no sign anywhere that there had been any disturbance or displacement
+of anything during the night.
+
+Utterly bewildered, he sat down in his room to think.  Now for the first
+time he _felt_ that he was asleep and dreaming.  Presently he fell asleep
+again, and slept for a long time.  He awoke hungry and made a hearty
+meal.  Then towards evening, having locked himself in, he fell asleep
+again.  When he woke he was in darkness, and was quite at sea as to his
+whereabouts.  He began feeling about the dark room, and was recalled to
+the consequences of his position by the breaking of a large piece of
+glass.  Having obtained a light, he discovered this to be a glass wheel,
+part of an elaborate piece of mechanism which he must in his sleep have
+taken from the chest, which was now opened.  He had once again opened it
+whilst asleep, but he had no recollection of the circumstances.
+
+Caswall came to the conclusion that there had been some sort of dual
+action of his mind, which might lead to some catastrophe or some
+discovery of his secret plans; so he resolved to forgo for a while the
+pleasure of making discoveries regarding the chest.  To this end, he
+applied himself to quite another matter--an investigation of the other
+treasures and rare objects in his collections.  He went amongst them in
+simple, idle curiosity, his main object being to discover some strange
+item which he might use for experiment with the kite.  He had already
+resolved to try some runners other than those made of paper.  He had a
+vague idea that with such a force as the great kite straining at its
+leash, this might be used to lift to the altitude of the kite itself
+heavier articles.  His first experiment with articles of little but
+increasing weight was eminently successful.  So he added by degrees more
+and more weight, until he found out that the lifting power of the kite
+was considerable.  He then determined to take a step further, and send to
+the kite some of the articles which lay in the steel-hooped chest.  The
+last time he had opened it in sleep, it had not been shut again, and he
+had inserted a wedge so that he could open it at will.  He made
+examination of the contents, but came to the conclusion that the glass
+objects were unsuitable.  They were too light for testing weight, and
+they were so frail as to be dangerous to send to such a height.
+
+So he looked around for something more solid with which to experiment.
+His eye caught sight of an object which at once attracted him.  This was
+a small copy of one of the ancient Egyptian gods--that of Bes, who
+represented the destructive power of nature.  It was so bizarre and
+mysterious as to commend itself to his mad humour.  In lifting it from
+the cabinet, he was struck by its great weight in proportion to its size.
+He made accurate examination of it by the aid of some instruments, and
+came to the conclusion that it was carved from a lump of lodestone.  He
+remembered that he had read somewhere of an ancient Egyptian god cut from
+a similar substance, and, thinking it over, he came to the conclusion
+that he must have read it in Sir Thomas Brown's _Popular Errors_, a book
+of the seventeenth century.  He got the book from the library, and looked
+out the passage:
+
+"A great example we have from the observation of our learned friend Mr.
+Graves, in an AEgyptian idol cut out of Loadstone and found among the
+Mummies; which still retains its attraction, though probably taken out of
+the mine about two thousand years ago."
+
+The strangeness of the figure, and its being so close akin to his own
+nature, attracted him.  He made from thin wood a large circular runner,
+and in front of it placed the weighty god, sending it up to the flying
+kite along the throbbing cord.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII--OOLANGA'S HALLUCINATIONS
+
+
+During the last few days Lady Arabella had been getting exceedingly
+impatient.  Her debts, always pressing, were growing to an embarrassing
+amount.  The only hope she had of comfort in life was a good marriage;
+but the good marriage on which she had fixed her eye did not seem to move
+quickly enough--indeed, it did not seem to move at all--in the right
+direction.  Edgar Caswall was not an ardent wooer.  From the very first
+he seemed _difficile_, but he had been keeping to his own room ever since
+his struggle with Mimi Watford.  On that occasion Lady Arabella had shown
+him in an unmistakable way what her feelings were; indeed, she had made
+it known to him, in a more overt way than pride should allow, that she
+wished to help and support him.  The moment when she had gone across the
+room to stand beside him in his mesmeric struggle, had been the very
+limit of her voluntary action.  It was quite bitter enough, she felt,
+that he did not come to her, but now that she had made that advance, she
+felt that any withdrawal on his part would, to a woman of her class, be
+nothing less than a flaming insult.  Had she not classed herself with his
+nigger servant, an unreformed savage?  Had she not shown her preference
+for him at the festival of his home-coming?  Had she not . . . Lady
+Arabella was cold-blooded, and she was prepared to go through all that
+might be necessary of indifference, and even insult, to become chatelaine
+of Castra Regis.  In the meantime, she would show no hurry--she must
+wait.  She might, in an unostentatious way, come to him again.  She knew
+him now, and could make a keen guess at his desires with regard to Lilla
+Watford.  With that secret in her possession, she could bring pressure to
+bear on Caswall which would make it no easy matter for him to evade her.
+The great difficulty was how to get near him.  He was shut up within his
+Castle, and guarded by a defence of convention which she could not pass
+without danger of ill repute to herself.  Over this question she thought
+and thought for days and nights.  At last she decided that the only way
+would be to go to him openly at Castra Regis.  Her rank and position
+would make such a thing possible, if carefully done.  She could explain
+matters afterwards if necessary.  Then when they were alone, she would
+use her arts and her experience to make him commit himself.  After all,
+he was only a man, with a man's dislike of difficult or awkward
+situations.  She felt quite sufficient confidence in her own womanhood to
+carry her through any difficulty which might arise.
+
+From Diana's Grove she heard each day the luncheon-gong from Castra Regis
+sound, and knew the hour when the servants would be in the back of the
+house.  She would enter the house at that hour, and, pretending that she
+could not make anyone hear her, would seek him in his own rooms.  The
+tower was, she knew, away from all the usual sounds of the house, and
+moreover she knew that the servants had strict orders not to interrupt
+him when he was in the turret chamber.  She had found out, partly by the
+aid of an opera-glass and partly by judicious questioning, that several
+times lately a heavy chest had been carried to and from his room, and
+that it rested in the room each night.  She was, therefore, confident
+that he had some important work on hand which would keep him busy for
+long spells.
+
+Meanwhile, another member of the household at Castra Regis had schemes
+which he thought were working to fruition.  A man in the position of a
+servant has plenty of opportunity of watching his betters and forming
+opinions regarding them.  Oolanga was in his way a clever, unscrupulous
+rogue, and he felt that with things moving round him in this great
+household there should be opportunities of self-advancement.  Being
+unscrupulous and stealthy--and a savage--he looked to dishonest means.  He
+saw plainly enough that Lady Arabella was making a dead set at his
+master, and he was watchful of the slightest sign of anything which might
+enhance this knowledge.  Like the other men in the house, he knew of the
+carrying to and fro of the great chest, and had got it into his head that
+the care exercised in its porterage indicated that it was full of
+treasure.  He was for ever lurking around the turret-rooms on the chance
+of making some useful discovery.  But he was as cautious as he was
+stealthy, and took care that no one else watched him.
+
+It was thus that the negro became aware of Lady Arabella's venture into
+the house, as she thought, unseen.  He took more care than ever, since he
+was watching another, that the positions were not reversed.  More than
+ever he kept his eyes and ears open and his mouth shut.  Seeing Lady
+Arabella gliding up the stairs towards his master's room, he took it for
+granted that she was there for no good, and doubled his watching
+intentness and caution.
+
+Oolanga was disappointed, but he dared not exhibit any feeling lest it
+should betray that he was hiding.  Therefore he slunk downstairs again
+noiselessly, and waited for a more favourable opportunity of furthering
+his plans.  It must be borne in mind that he thought that the heavy trunk
+was full of valuables, and that he believed that Lady Arabella had come
+to try to steal it.  His purpose of using for his own advantage the
+combination of these two ideas was seen later in the day.  Oolanga
+secretly followed her home.  He was an expert at this game, and succeeded
+admirably on this occasion.  He watched her enter the private gate of
+Diana's Grove, and then, taking a roundabout course and keeping out of
+her sight, he at last overtook her in a thick part of the Grove where no
+one could see the meeting.
+
+Lady Arabella was much surprised.  She had not seen the negro for several
+days, and had almost forgotten his existence.  Oolanga would have been
+startled had he known and been capable of understanding the real value
+placed on him, his beauty, his worthiness, by other persons, and compared
+it with the value in these matters in which he held himself.  Doubtless
+Oolanga had his dreams like other men.  In such cases he saw himself as a
+young sun-god, as beautiful as the eye of dusky or even white womanhood
+had ever dwelt upon.  He would have been filled with all noble and
+captivating qualities--or those regarded as such in West Africa.  Women
+would have loved him, and would have told him so in the overt and fervid
+manner usual in affairs of the heart in the shadowy depths of the forest
+of the Gold Coast.
+
+Oolanga came close behind Lady Arabella, and in a hushed voice, suitable
+to the importance of his task, and in deference to the respect he had for
+her and the place, began to unfold the story of his love.  Lady Arabella
+was not usually a humorous person, but no man or woman of the white race
+could have checked the laughter which rose spontaneously to her lips.  The
+circumstances were too grotesque, the contrast too violent, for subdued
+mirth.  The man a debased specimen of one of the most primitive races of
+the earth, and of an ugliness which was simply devilish; the woman of
+high degree, beautiful, accomplished.  She thought that her first
+moment's consideration of the outrage--it was nothing less in her
+eyes--had given her the full material for thought.  But every instant
+after threw new and varied lights on the affront.  Her indignation was
+too great for passion; only irony or satire would meet the situation.  Her
+cold, cruel nature helped, and she did not shrink to subject this
+ignorant savage to the merciless fire-lash of her scorn.
+
+Oolanga was dimly conscious that he was being flouted; but his anger was
+no less keen because of the measure of his ignorance.  So he gave way to
+it, as does a tortured beast.  He ground his great teeth together, raved,
+stamped, and swore in barbarous tongues and with barbarous imagery.  Even
+Lady Arabella felt that it was well she was within reach of help, or he
+might have offered her brutal violence--even have killed her.
+
+"Am I to understand," she said with cold disdain, so much more effective
+to wound than hot passion, "that you are offering me your love?
+Your--love?"
+
+For reply he nodded his head.  The scorn of her voice, in a sort of
+baleful hiss, sounded--and felt--like the lash of a whip.
+
+"And you dared! you--a savage--a slave--the basest thing in the world of
+vermin!  Take care!  I don't value your worthless life more than I do
+that of a rat or a spider.  Don't let me ever see your hideous face here
+again, or I shall rid the earth of you."
+
+As she was speaking, she had taken out her revolver and was pointing it
+at him.  In the immediate presence of death his impudence forsook him,
+and he made a weak effort to justify himself.  His speech was short,
+consisting of single words.  To Lady Arabella it sounded mere gibberish,
+but it was in his own dialect, and meant love, marriage, wife.  From the
+intonation of the words, she guessed, with her woman's quick intuition,
+at their meaning; but she quite failed to follow, when, becoming more
+pressing, he continued to urge his suit in a mixture of the grossest
+animal passion and ridiculous threats.  He warned her that he knew she
+had tried to steal his master's treasure, and that he had caught her in
+the act.  But if she would be his, he would share the treasure with her,
+and they could live in luxury in the African forests.  But if she
+refused, he would tell his master, who would flog and torture her and
+then give her to the police, who would kill her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV--BATTLE RENEWED
+
+
+The consequences of that meeting in the dusk of Diana's Grove were acute
+and far-reaching, and not only to the two engaged in it.  From Oolanga,
+this might have been expected by anyone who knew the character of the
+tropical African savage.  To such, there are two passions that are
+inexhaustible and insatiable--vanity and that which they are pleased to
+call love.  Oolanga left the Grove with an absorbing hatred in his heart.
+His lust and greed were afire, while his vanity had been wounded to the
+core.  Lady Arabella's icy nature was not so deeply stirred, though she
+was in a seething passion.  More than ever she was set upon bringing
+Edgar Caswall to her feet.  The obstacles she had encountered, the
+insults she had endured, were only as fuel to the purpose of revenge
+which consumed her.
+
+As she sought her own rooms in Diana's Grove, she went over the whole
+subject again and again, always finding in the face of Lilla Watford a
+key to a problem which puzzled her--the problem of a way to turn
+Caswall's powers--his very existence--to aid her purpose.
+
+When in her boudoir, she wrote a note, taking so much trouble over it
+that she destroyed, and rewrote, till her dainty waste-basket was half-
+full of torn sheets of notepaper.  When quite satisfied, she copied out
+the last sheet afresh, and then carefully burned all the spoiled
+fragments.  She put the copied note in an emblazoned envelope, and
+directed it to Edgar Caswall at Castra Regis.  This she sent off by one
+of her grooms.  The letter ran:
+
+   "DEAR MR. CASWALL,
+
+   "I want to have a chat with you on a subject in which I believe you
+   are interested.  Will you kindly call for me one day after lunch--say
+   at three or four o'clock, and we can walk a little way together.  Only
+   as far as Mercy Farm, where I want to see Lilla and Mimi Watford.  We
+   can take a cup of tea at the Farm.  Do not bring your African servant
+   with you, as I am afraid his face frightens the girls.  After all, he
+   is not pretty, is he?  I have an idea you will be pleased with your
+   visit this time.
+
+   "Yours sincerely,
+
+   "ARABELLA MARCH."
+
+At half-past three next day, Edgar Caswall called at Diana's Grove.  Lady
+Arabella met him on the roadway outside the gate.  She wished to take the
+servants into her confidence as little as possible.  She turned when she
+saw him coming, and walked beside him towards Mercy Farm, keeping step
+with him as they walked.  When they got near Mercy, she turned and looked
+around her, expecting to see Oolanga or some sign of him.  He was,
+however, not visible.  He had received from his master peremptory orders
+to keep out of sight--an order for which the African scored a new offence
+up against her.  They found Lilla and Mimi at home and seemingly glad to
+see them, though both the girls were surprised at the visit coming so
+soon after the other.
+
+The proceedings were a repetition of the battle of souls of the former
+visit.  On this occasion, however, Edgar Caswall had only the presence of
+Lady Arabella to support him--Oolanga being absent; but Mimi lacked the
+support of Adam Salton, which had been of such effective service before.
+This time the struggle for supremacy of will was longer and more
+determined.  Caswall felt that if he could not achieve supremacy he had
+better give up the idea, so all his pride was enlisted against Mimi.  When
+they had been waiting for the door to be opened, Lady Arabella, believing
+in a sudden attack, had said to him in a low voice, which somehow carried
+conviction:
+
+"This time you should win.  Mimi is, after all, only a woman.  Show her
+no mercy.  That is weakness.  Fight her, beat her, trample on her--kill
+her if need be.  She stands in your way, and I hate her.  Never take your
+eyes off her.  Never mind Lilla--she is afraid of you.  You are already
+her master.  Mimi will try to make you look at her cousin.  There lies
+defeat.  Let nothing take your attention from Mimi, and you will win.  If
+she is overcoming you, take my hand and hold it hard whilst you are
+looking into her eyes.  If she is too strong for you, I shall interfere.
+I'll make a diversion, and under cover of it you must retire unbeaten,
+even if not victorious.  Hush! they are coming."
+
+The two girls came to the door together.  Strange sounds were coming up
+over the Brow from the west.  It was the rustling and crackling of the
+dry reeds and rushes from the low lands.  The season had been an
+unusually dry one.  Also the strong east wind was helping forward
+enormous flocks of birds, most of them pigeons with white cowls.  Not
+only were their wings whirring, but their cooing was plainly audible.
+From such a multitude of birds the mass of sound, individually small,
+assumed the volume of a storm.  Surprised at the influx of birds, to
+which they had been strangers so long, they all looked towards Castra
+Regis, from whose high tower the great kite had been flying as usual.  But
+even as they looked, the cord broke, and the great kite fell headlong in
+a series of sweeping dives.  Its own weight, and the aerial force opposed
+to it, which caused it to rise, combined with the strong easterly breeze,
+had been too much for the great length of cord holding it.
+
+Somehow, the mishap to the kite gave new hope to Mimi.  It was as though
+the side issues had been shorn away, so that the main struggle was
+thenceforth on simpler lines.  She had a feeling in her heart, as though
+some religious chord had been newly touched.  It may, of course, have
+been that with the renewal of the bird voices a fresh courage, a fresh
+belief in the good issue of the struggle came too.  In the misery of
+silence, from which they had all suffered for so long, any new train of
+thought was almost bound to be a boon.  As the inrush of birds continued,
+their wings beating against the crackling rushes, Lady Arabella grew
+pale, and almost fainted.
+
+"What is that?" she asked suddenly.
+
+To Mimi, born and bred in Siam, the sound was strangely like an
+exaggeration of the sound produced by a snake-charmer.
+
+Edgar Caswall was the first to recover from the interruption of the
+falling kite.  After a few minutes he seemed to have quite recovered his
+_sang froid_, and was able to use his brains to the end which he had in
+view.  Mimi too quickly recovered herself, but from a different cause.
+With her it was a deep religious conviction that the struggle round her
+was of the powers of Good and Evil, and that Good was triumphing.  The
+very appearance of the snowy birds, with the cowls of Saint Columba,
+heightened the impression.  With this conviction strong upon her, she
+continued the strange battle with fresh vigour.  She seemed to tower over
+Caswall, and he to give back before her oncoming.  Once again her
+vigorous passes drove him to the door.  He was just going out backward
+when Lady Arabella, who had been gazing at him with fixed eyes, caught
+his hand and tried to stop his movement.  She was, however, unable to do
+any good, and so, holding hands, they passed out together.  As they did
+so, the strange music which had so alarmed Lady Arabella suddenly
+stopped.  Instinctively they all looked towards the tower of Castra
+Regis, and saw that the workmen had refixed the kite, which had risen
+again and was beginning to float out to its former station.
+
+As they were looking, the door opened and Michael Watford came into the
+room.  By that time all had recovered their self-possession, and there
+was nothing out of the common to attract his attention.  As he came in,
+seeing inquiring looks all around him, he said:
+
+"The new influx of birds is only the annual migration of pigeons from
+Africa.  I am told that it will soon be over."
+
+The second victory of Mimi Watford made Edgar Caswall more moody than
+ever.  He felt thrown back on himself, and this, added to his absorbing
+interest in the hope of a victory of his mesmeric powers, became a deep
+and settled purpose of revenge.  The chief object of his animosity was,
+of course, Mimi, whose will had overcome his, but it was obscured in
+greater or lesser degree by all who had opposed him.  Lilla was next to
+Mimi in his hate--Lilla, the harmless, tender-hearted, sweet-natured
+girl, whose heart was so full of love for all things that in it was no
+room for the passions of ordinary life--whose nature resembled those
+doves of St. Columba, whose colour she wore, whose appearance she
+reflected.  Adam Salton came next--after a gap; for against him Caswall
+had no direct animosity.  He regarded him as an interference, a
+difficulty to be got rid of or destroyed.  The young Australian had been
+so discreet that the most he had against him was his knowledge of what
+had been.  Caswall did not understand him, and to such a nature as his,
+ignorance was a cause of alarm, of dread.
+
+Caswall resumed his habit of watching the great kite straining at its
+cord, varying his vigils in this way by a further examination of the
+mysterious treasures of his house, especially Mesmer's chest.  He sat
+much on the roof of the tower, brooding over his thwarted passion.  The
+vast extent of his possessions, visible to him at that altitude, might,
+one would have thought, have restored some of his complacency.  But the
+very extent of his ownership, thus perpetually brought before him,
+created a fresh sense of grievance.  How was it, he thought, that with so
+much at command that others wished for, he could not achieve the dearest
+wishes of his heart?
+
+In this state of intellectual and moral depravity, he found a solace in
+the renewal of his experiments with the mechanical powers of the kite.
+For a couple of weeks he did not see Lady Arabella, who was always on the
+watch for a chance of meeting him; neither did he see the Watford girls,
+who studiously kept out of his way.  Adam Salton simply marked time,
+keeping ready to deal with anything that might affect his friends.  He
+called at the farm and heard from Mimi of the last battle of wills, but
+it had only one consequence.  He got from Ross several more mongooses,
+including a second king-cobra-killer, which he generally carried with him
+in its box whenever he walked out.
+
+Mr. Caswall's experiments with the kite went on successfully.  Each day
+he tried the lifting of greater weight, and it seemed almost as if the
+machine had a sentience of its own, which was increasing with the
+obstacles placed before it.  All this time the kite hung in the sky at an
+enormous height.  The wind was steadily from the north, so the trend of
+the kite was to the south.  All day long, runners of increasing magnitude
+were sent up.  These were only of paper or thin cardboard, or leather, or
+other flexible materials.  The great height at which the kite hung made a
+great concave curve in the string, so that as the runners went up they
+made a flapping sound.  If one laid a finger on the string, the sound
+answered to the flapping of the runner in a sort of hollow intermittent
+murmur.  Edgar Caswall, who was now wholly obsessed by the kite and all
+belonging to it, found a distinct resemblance between that intermittent
+rumble and the snake-charming music produced by the pigeons flying
+through the dry reeds.
+
+One day he made a discovery in Mesmer's chest which he thought he would
+utilise with regard to the runners.  This was a great length of wire,
+"fine as human hair," coiled round a finely made wheel, which ran to a
+wondrous distance freely, and as lightly.  He tried this on runners, and
+found it work admirably.  Whether the runner was alone, or carried
+something much more weighty than itself, it worked equally well.  Also it
+was strong enough and light enough to draw back the runner without undue
+strain.  He tried this a good many times successfully, but it was now
+growing dusk and he found some difficulty in keeping the runner in sight.
+So he looked for something heavy enough to keep it still.  He placed the
+Egyptian image of Bes on the fine wire, which crossed the wooden ledge
+which protected it.  Then, the darkness growing, he went indoors and
+forgot all about it.
+
+He had a strange feeling of uneasiness that night--not sleeplessness, for
+he seemed conscious of being asleep.  At daylight he rose, and as usual
+looked out for the kite.  He did not see it in its usual position in the
+sky, so looked round the points of the compass.  He was more than
+astonished when presently he saw the missing kite struggling as usual
+against the controlling cord.  But it had gone to the further side of the
+tower, and now hung and strained _against the wind_ to the north.  He
+thought it so strange that he determined to investigate the phenomenon,
+and to say nothing about it in the meantime.
+
+In his many travels, Edgar Caswall had been accustomed to use the
+sextant, and was now an expert in the matter.  By the aid of this and
+other instruments, he was able to fix the position of the kite and the
+point over which it hung.  He was startled to find that exactly under
+it--so far as he could ascertain--was Diana's Grove.  He had an
+inclination to take Lady Arabella into his confidence in the matter, but
+he thought better of it and wisely refrained.  For some reason which he
+did not try to explain to himself, he was glad of his silence, when, on
+the following morning, he found, on looking out, that the point over
+which the kite then hovered was Mercy Farm.  When he had verified this
+with his instruments, he sat before the window of the tower, looking out
+and thinking.  The new locality was more to his liking than the other;
+but the why of it puzzled him, all the same.  He spent the rest of the
+day in the turret-room, which he did not leave all day.  It seemed to him
+that he was now drawn by forces which he could not control--of which,
+indeed, he had no knowledge--in directions which he did not understand,
+and which were without his own volition.  In sheer helpless inability to
+think the problem out satisfactorily, he called up a servant and told him
+to tell Oolanga that he wanted to see him at once in the turret-room.  The
+answer came back that the African had not been seen since the previous
+evening.
+
+Caswall was now so irritable that even this small thing upset him.  As he
+was distrait and wanted to talk to somebody, he sent for Simon Chester,
+who came at once, breathless with hurrying and upset by the unexpected
+summons.  Caswall bade him sit down, and when the old man was in a less
+uneasy frame of mind, he again asked him if he had ever seen what was in
+Mesmer's chest or heard it spoken about.
+
+Chester admitted that he had once, in the time of "the then Mr. Edgar,"
+seen the chest open, which, knowing something of its history and guessing
+more, so upset him that he had fainted.  When he recovered, the chest was
+closed.  From that time the then Mr. Edgar had never spoken about it
+again.
+
+When Caswall asked him to describe what he had seen when the chest was
+open, he got very agitated, and, despite all his efforts to remain calm,
+he suddenly went off into a faint.  Caswall summoned servants, who
+applied the usual remedies.  Still the old man did not recover.  After
+the lapse of a considerable time, the doctor who had been summoned made
+his appearance.  A glance was sufficient for him to make up his mind.
+Still, he knelt down by the old man, and made a careful examination.  Then
+he rose to his feet, and in a hushed voice said:
+
+"I grieve to say, sir, that he has passed away."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV--ON THE TRACK
+
+
+Those who had seen Edgar Caswall familiarly since his arrival, and had
+already estimated his cold-blooded nature at something of its true value,
+were surprised that he took so to heart the death of old Chester.  The
+fact was that not one of them had guessed correctly at his character.
+They thought, naturally enough, that the concern which he felt was that
+of a master for a faithful old servant of his family.  They little
+thought that it was merely the selfish expression of his disappointment,
+that he had thus lost the only remaining clue to an interesting piece of
+family history--one which was now and would be for ever wrapped in
+mystery.  Caswall knew enough about the life of his ancestor in Paris to
+wish to know more fully and more thoroughly all that had been.  The
+period covered by that ancestor's life in Paris was one inviting every
+form of curiosity.
+
+Lady Arabella, who had her own game to play, saw in the _metier_ of
+sympathetic friend, a series of meetings with the man she wanted to
+secure.  She made the first use of the opportunity the day after old
+Chester's death; indeed, as soon as the news had filtered in through the
+back door of Diana's Grove.  At that meeting, she played her part so well
+that even Caswall's cold nature was impressed.
+
+Oolanga was the only one who did not credit her with at least some sense
+of fine feeling in the matter.  In emotional, as in other matters,
+Oolanga was distinctly a utilitarian, and as he could not understand
+anyone feeling grief except for his own suffering, pain, or for the loss
+of money, he could not understand anyone simulating such an emotion
+except for show intended to deceive.  He thought that she had come to
+Castra Regis again for the opportunity of stealing something, and was
+determined that on this occasion the chance of pressing his advantage
+over her should not pass.  He felt, therefore, that the occasion was one
+for extra carefulness in the watching of all that went on.  Ever since he
+had come to the conclusion that Lady Arabella was trying to steal the
+treasure-chest, he suspected nearly everyone of the same design, and made
+it a point to watch all suspicious persons and places.  As Adam was
+engaged on his own researches regarding Lady Arabella, it was only
+natural that there should be some crossing of each other's tracks.  This
+is what did actually happen.
+
+Adam had gone for an early morning survey of the place in which he was
+interested, taking with him the mongoose in its box.  He arrived at the
+gate of Diana's Grove just as Lady Arabella was preparing to set out for
+Castra Regis on what she considered her mission of comfort.  Seeing Adam
+from her window going through the shadows of the trees round the gate,
+she thought that he must be engaged on some purpose similar to her own.
+So, quickly making her toilet, she quietly left the house, and, taking
+advantage of every shadow and substance which could hide her, followed
+him on his walk.
+
+Oolanga, the experienced tracker, followed her, but succeeded in hiding
+his movements better than she did.  He saw that Adam had on his shoulder
+a mysterious box, which he took to contain something valuable.  Seeing
+that Lady Arabella was secretly following Adam, he was confirmed in this
+idea.  His mind--such as it was--was fixed on her trying to steal, and he
+credited her at once with making use of this new opportunity.
+
+In his walk, Adam went into the grounds of Castra Regis, and Oolanga saw
+her follow him with great secrecy.  He feared to go closer, as now on
+both sides of him were enemies who might make discovery.  When he
+realised that Lady Arabella was bound for the Castle, he devoted himself
+to following her with singleness of purpose.  He therefore missed seeing
+that Adam branched off the track and returned to the high road.
+
+That night Edgar Caswall had slept badly.  The tragic occurrence of the
+day was on his mind, and he kept waking and thinking of it.  After an
+early breakfast, he sat at the open window watching the kite and thinking
+of many things.  From his room he could see all round the neighbourhood,
+but the two places that interested him most were Mercy Farm and Diana's
+Grove.  At first the movements about those spots were of a humble
+kind--those that belong to domestic service or agricultural needs--the
+opening of doors and windows, the sweeping and brushing, and generally
+the restoration of habitual order.
+
+From his high window--whose height made it a screen from the observation
+of others--he saw the chain of watchers move into his own grounds, and
+then presently break up--Adam Salton going one way, and Lady Arabella,
+followed by the nigger, another.  Then Oolanga disappeared amongst the
+trees; but Caswall could see that he was still watching.  Lady Arabella,
+after looking around her, slipped in by the open door, and he could, of
+course, see her no longer.
+
+Presently, however, he heard a light tap at his door, then the door
+opened slowly, and he could see the flash of Lady Arabella's white dress
+through the opening.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI--A VISIT OF SYMPATHY
+
+
+Caswall was genuinely surprised when he saw Lady Arabella, though he need
+not have been, after what had already occurred in the same way.  The look
+of surprise on his face was so much greater than Lady Arabella had
+expected--though she thought she was prepared to meet anything that might
+occur--that she stood still, in sheer amazement.  Cold-blooded as she was
+and ready for all social emergencies, she was nonplussed how to go on.
+She was plucky, however, and began to speak at once, although she had not
+the slightest idea what she was going to say.
+
+"I came to offer you my very warm sympathy with the grief you have so
+lately experienced."
+
+"My grief?  I'm afraid I must be very dull; but I really do not
+understand."
+
+Already she felt at a disadvantage, and hesitated.
+
+"I mean about the old man who died so suddenly--your old . . . retainer."
+
+Caswall's face relaxed something of its puzzled concentration.
+
+"Oh, he was only a servant; and he had over-stayed his three-score and
+ten years by something like twenty years.  He must have been ninety!"
+
+"Still, as an old servant . . . "
+
+Caswall's words were not so cold as their inflection.
+
+"I never interfere with servants.  He was kept on here merely because he
+had been so long on the premises.  I suppose the steward thought it might
+make him unpopular if the old fellow had been dismissed."
+
+How on earth was she to proceed on such a task as hers if this was the
+utmost geniality she could expect?  So she at once tried another
+tack--this time a personal one.
+
+"I am sorry I disturbed you.  I am really not unconventional--though
+certainly no slave to convention.  Still there are limits . . . it is bad
+enough to intrude in this way, and I do not know what you can say or
+think of the time selected, for the intrusion."
+
+After all, Edgar Caswall was a gentleman by custom and habit, so he rose
+to the occasion.
+
+"I can only say, Lady Arabella, that you are always welcome at any time
+you may deign to honour my house with your presence."
+
+She smiled at him sweetly.
+
+"Thank you _so_ much.  You _do_ put one at ease.  My breach of convention
+makes me glad rather than sorry.  I feel that I can open my heart to you
+about anything."
+
+Forthwith she proceeded to tell him about Oolanga and his strange
+suspicions of her honesty.  Caswall laughed and made her explain all the
+details.  His final comment was enlightening.
+
+"Let me give you a word of advice: If you have the slightest fault to
+find with that infernal nigger, shoot him at sight.  A swelled-headed
+nigger, with a bee in his bonnet, is one of the worst difficulties in the
+world to deal with.  So better make a clean job of it, and wipe him out
+at once!"
+
+"But what about the law, Mr. Caswall?"
+
+"Oh, the law doesn't concern itself much about dead niggers.  A few more
+or less do not matter.  To my mind it's rather a relief!"
+
+"I'm afraid of you," was her only comment, made with a sweet smile and in
+a soft voice.
+
+"All right," he said, "let us leave it at that.  Anyhow, we shall be rid
+of one of them!"
+
+"I don't love niggers any more than you do," she replied, "and I suppose
+one mustn't be too particular where that sort of cleaning up is
+concerned."  Then she changed in voice and manner, and asked genially:
+"And now tell me, am I forgiven?"
+
+"You are, dear lady--if there is anything to forgive."
+
+As he spoke, seeing that she had moved to go, he came to the door with
+her, and in the most natural way accompanied her downstairs.  He passed
+through the hall with her and down the avenue.  As he went back to the
+house, she smiled to herself.
+
+"Well, that is all right.  I don't think the morning has been altogether
+thrown away."
+
+And she walked slowly back to Diana's Grove.
+
+Adam Salton followed the line of the Brow, and refreshed his memory as to
+the various localities.  He got home to Lesser Hill just as Sir Nathaniel
+was beginning lunch.  Mr. Salton had gone to Walsall to keep an early
+appointment; so he was all alone.  When the meal was over--seeing in
+Adam's face that he had something to speak about--he followed into the
+study and shut the door.
+
+When the two men had lighted their pipes, Sir Nathaniel began.
+
+"I have remembered an interesting fact about Diana's Grove--there is, I
+have long understood, some strange mystery about that house.  It may be
+of some interest, or it may be trivial, in such a tangled skein as we are
+trying to unravel."
+
+"Please tell me all you know or suspect.  To begin, then, of what sort
+is the mystery--physical, mental, moral, historical, scientific, occult?
+Any kind of hint will help me."
+
+"Quite right.  I shall try to tell you what I think; but I have not put
+my thoughts on the subject in sequence, so you must forgive me if due
+order is not observed in my narration.  I suppose you have seen the house
+at Diana's Grove?"
+
+"The outside of it; but I have that in my mind's eye, and I can fit into
+my memory whatever you may mention."
+
+"The house is very old--probably the first house of some sort that stood
+there was in the time of the Romans.  This was probably renewed--perhaps
+several times at later periods.  The house stands, or, rather, used to
+stand here when Mercia was a kingdom--I do not suppose that the basement
+can be later than the Norman Conquest.  Some years ago, when I was
+President of the Mercian Archaeological Society, I went all over it very
+carefully.  This was when it was purchased by Captain March.  The house
+had then been done up, so as to be suitable for the bride.  The basement
+is very strong,--almost as strong and as heavy as if it had been intended
+as a fortress.  There are a whole series of rooms deep underground.  One
+of them in particular struck me.  The room itself is of considerable
+size, but the masonry is more than massive.  In the middle of the room is
+a sunk well, built up to floor level and evidently going deep
+underground.  There is no windlass nor any trace of there ever having
+been any--no rope--nothing.  Now, we know that the Romans had wells of
+immense depth, from which the water was lifted by the 'old rag rope';
+that at Woodhull used to be nearly a thousand feet.  Here, then, we have
+simply an enormously deep well-hole.  The door of the room was massive,
+and was fastened with a lock nearly a foot square.  It was evidently
+intended for some kind of protection to someone or something; but no one
+in those days had ever heard of anyone having been allowed even to see
+the room.  All this is _a propos_ of a suggestion on my part that the
+well-hole was a way by which the White Worm (whatever it was) went and
+came.  At that time I would have had a search made--even excavation if
+necessary--at my own expense, but all suggestions were met with a prompt
+and explicit negative.  So, of course, I took no further step in the
+matter.  Then it died out of recollection--even of mine."
+
+"Do you remember, sir," asked Adam, "what was the appearance of the room
+where the well-hole was?  Was there furniture--in fact, any sort of thing
+in the room?"
+
+"The only thing I remember was a sort of green light--very clouded, very
+dim--which came up from the well.  Not a fixed light, but intermittent
+and irregular--quite unlike anything I had ever seen."
+
+"Do you remember how you got into the well-room?  Was there a separate
+door from outside, or was there any interior room or passage which opened
+into it?"
+
+"I think there must have been some room with a way into it.  I remember
+going up some steep steps; they must have been worn smooth by long use or
+something of the kind, for I could hardly keep my feet as I went up.  Once
+I stumbled and nearly fell into the well-hole."
+
+"Was there anything strange about the place--any queer smell, for
+instance?"
+
+"Queer smell--yes!  Like bilge or a rank swamp.  It was distinctly
+nauseating; when I came out I felt as if I had just been going to be
+sick.  I shall try back on my visit and see if I can recall any more of
+what I saw or felt."
+
+"Then perhaps, sir, later in the day you will tell me anything you may
+chance to recollect."
+
+"I shall be delighted, Adam.  If your uncle has not returned by then,
+I'll join you in the study after dinner, and we can resume this
+interesting chat."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII--THE MYSTERY OF "THE GROVE"
+
+
+That afternoon Adam decided to do a little exploring.  As he passed
+through the wood outside the gate of Diana's Grove, he thought he saw the
+African's face for an instant.  So he went deeper into the undergrowth,
+and followed along parallel to the avenue to the house.  He was glad that
+there was no workman or servant about, for he did not care that any of
+Lady Arabella's people should find him wandering about her grounds.
+Taking advantage of the denseness of the trees, he came close to the
+house and skirted round it.  He was repaid for his trouble, for on the
+far side of the house, close to where the rocky frontage of the cliff
+fell away, he saw Oolanga crouched behind the irregular trunk of a great
+oak.  The man was so intent on watching someone, or something, that he
+did not guard against being himself watched.  This suited Adam, for he
+could thus make scrutiny at will.
+
+The thick wood, though the trees were mostly of small girth, threw a
+heavy shadow, so that the steep declension, in front of which grew the
+tree behind which the African lurked, was almost in darkness.  Adam drew
+as close as he could, and was amazed to see a patch of light on the
+ground before him; when he realised what it was, he was determined, more
+than ever to follow on his quest.  The nigger had a dark lantern in his
+hand, and was throwing the light down the steep incline.  The glare
+showed a series of stone steps, which ended in a low-lying heavy iron
+door fixed against the side of the house.  All the strange things he had
+heard from Sir Nathaniel, and all those, little and big, which he had
+himself noticed, crowded into his mind in a chaotic way.  Instinctively
+he took refuge behind a thick oak stem, and set himself down, to watch
+what might occur.
+
+After a short time it became apparent that the African was trying to find
+out what was behind the heavy door.  There was no way of looking in, for
+the door fitted tight into the massive stone slabs.  The only opportunity
+for the entrance of light was through a small hole between the great
+stones above the door.  This hole was too high up to look through from
+the ground level.  Oolanga, having tried standing tiptoe on the highest
+point near, and holding the lantern as high as he could, threw the light
+round the edges of the door to see if he could find anywhere a hole or a
+flaw in the metal through which he could obtain a glimpse.  Foiled in
+this, he brought from the shrubbery a plank, which he leant against the
+top of the door and then climbed up with great dexterity.  This did not
+bring him near enough to the window-hole to look in, or even to throw the
+light of the lantern through it, so he climbed down and carried the plank
+back to the place from which he had got it.  Then he concealed himself
+near the iron door and waited, manifestly with the intent of remaining
+there till someone came near.  Presently Lady Arabella, moving
+noiselessly through the shade, approached the door.  When he saw her
+close enough to touch it, Oolanga stepped forward from his concealment,
+and spoke in a whisper, which through the gloom sounded like a hiss.
+
+"I want to see you, missy--soon and secret."
+
+"What do you want?"
+
+"You know well, missy; I told you already."
+
+She turned on him with blazing eyes, the green tint in them glowing like
+emeralds.
+
+"Come, none of that.  If there is anything sensible which you wish to say
+to me, you can see me here, just where we are, at seven o'clock."
+
+He made no reply in words, but, putting the backs of his hands together,
+bent lower and lower till his forehead touched the earth.  Then he rose
+and went slowly away.
+
+Adam Salton, from his hiding-place, saw and wondered.  In a few minutes
+he moved from his place and went home to Lesser Hill, fully determined
+that seven o'clock would find him in some hidden place behind Diana's
+Grove.
+
+At a little before seven Adam stole softly out of the house and took the
+back-way to the rear of Diana's Grove.  The place seemed silent and
+deserted, so he took the opportunity of concealing himself near the spot
+whence he had seen Oolanga trying to investigate whatever was concealed
+behind the iron door.  He waited, perfectly still, and at last saw a
+gleam of white passing soundlessly through the undergrowth.  He was not
+surprised when he recognised the colour of Lady Arabella's dress.  She
+came close and waited, with her face to the iron door.  From some place
+of concealment near at hand Oolanga appeared, and came close to her.  Adam
+noticed, with surprised amusement, that over his shoulder was the box
+with the mongoose.  Of course the African did not know that he was seen
+by anyone, least of all by the man whose property he had with him.
+
+Silent-footed as he was, Lady Arabella heard him coming, and turned to
+meet him.  It was somewhat hard to see in the gloom, for, as usual, he
+was all in black, only his collar and cuffs showing white.  Lady Arabella
+opened the conversation which ensued between the two.
+
+"What do you want?  To rob me, or murder me?"
+
+"No, to lub you!"
+
+This frightened her a little, and she tried to change the tone.
+
+"Is that a coffin you have with you?  If so, you are wasting your time.
+It would not hold me."
+
+When a nigger suspects he is being laughed at, all the ferocity of his
+nature comes to the front; and this man was of the lowest kind.
+
+"Dis ain't no coffin for nobody.  Dis box is for you.  Somefin you lub.
+Me give him to you!"
+
+Still anxious to keep off the subject of affection, on which she believed
+him to have become crazed, she made another effort to keep his mind
+elsewhere.
+
+"Is this why you want to see me?"  He nodded.  "Then come round to the
+other door.  But be quiet.  I have no desire to be seen so close to my
+own house in conversation with a--a--a nigger like you!"
+
+She had chosen the word deliberately.  She wished to meet his passion
+with another kind.  Such would, at all events, help to keep him quiet.  In
+the deep gloom she could not see the anger which suffused his face.
+Rolling eyeballs and grinding teeth are, however, sufficient signs of
+anger to be decipherable in the dark.  She moved round the corner of the
+house to her right.  Oolanga was following her, when she stopped him by
+raising her hand.
+
+"No, not that door," she said; "that is not for niggers.  The other door
+will do well enough for you!"
+
+Lady Arabella took in her hand a small key which hung at the end of her
+watch-chain, and moved to a small door, low down, round the corner, and a
+little downhill from the edge of the Brow.  Oolanga, in obedience to her
+gesture, went back to the iron door.  Adam looked carefully at the
+mongoose box as the African went by, and was glad to see that it was
+intact.  Unconsciously, as he looked, he fingered the key that was in his
+waistcoat pocket.  When Oolanga was out of sight, Adam hurried after Lady
+Arabella.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII--EXIT OOLANGA
+
+
+The woman turned sharply as Adam touched her shoulder.
+
+"One moment whilst we are alone.  You had better not trust that nigger!"
+he whispered.
+
+Her answer was crisp and concise:
+
+"I don't."
+
+"Forewarned is forearmed.  Tell me if you will--it is for your own
+protection.  Why do you mistrust him?"
+
+"My friend, you have no idea of that man's impudence.  Would you believe
+that he wants me to marry him?"
+
+"No!" said Adam incredulously, amused in spite of himself.
+
+"Yes, and wanted to bribe me to do it by sharing a chest of treasure--at
+least, he thought it was--stolen from Mr. Caswall.  Why do you distrust
+him, Mr. Salton?"
+
+"Did you notice that box he had slung on his shoulder?  That belongs to
+me.  I left it in the gun-room when I went to lunch.  He must have crept
+in and stolen it.  Doubtless he thinks that it, too, is full of
+treasure."
+
+"He does!"
+
+"How on earth do you know?" asked Adam.
+
+"A little while ago he offered to give it to me--another bribe to accept
+him.  Faugh!  I am ashamed to tell you such a thing.  The beast!"
+
+Whilst they had been speaking, she had opened the door, a narrow iron
+one, well hung, for it opened easily and closed tightly without any
+creaking or sound of any kind.  Within all was dark; but she entered as
+freely and with as little misgiving or restraint as if it had been broad
+daylight.  For Adam, there was just sufficient green light from somewhere
+for him to see that there was a broad flight of heavy stone steps leading
+upward; but Lady Arabella, after shutting the door behind her, when it
+closed tightly without a clang, tripped up the steps lightly and swiftly.
+For an instant all was dark, but there came again the faint green light
+which enabled him to see the outlines of things.  Another iron door,
+narrow like the first and fairly high, led into another large room, the
+walls of which were of massive stones, so closely joined together as to
+exhibit only one smooth surface.  This presented the appearance of having
+at one time been polished.  On the far side, also smooth like the walls,
+was the reverse of a wide, but not high, iron door.  Here there was a
+little more light, for the high-up aperture over the door opened to the
+air.
+
+Lady Arabella took from her girdle another small key, which she inserted
+in a keyhole in the centre of a massive lock.  The great bolt seemed
+wonderfully hung, for the moment the small key was turned, the bolts of
+the great lock moved noiselessly and the iron doors swung open.  On the
+stone steps outside stood Oolanga, with the mongoose box slung over his
+shoulder.  Lady Arabella stood a little on one side, and the African,
+accepting the movement as an invitation, entered in an obsequious way.
+The moment, however, that he was inside, he gave a quick look around him.
+
+"Much death here--big death.  Many deaths.  Good, good!"
+
+He sniffed round as if he was enjoying the scent.  The matter and manner
+of his speech were so revolting that instinctively Adam's hand wandered
+to his revolver, and, with his finger on the trigger, he rested satisfied
+that he was ready for any emergency.
+
+There was certainly opportunity for the nigger's enjoyment, for the open
+well-hole was almost under his nose, sending up such a stench as almost
+made Adam sick, though Lady Arabella seemed not to mind it at all.  It
+was like nothing that Adam had ever met with.  He compared it with all
+the noxious experiences he had ever had--the drainage of war hospitals,
+of slaughter-houses, the refuse of dissecting rooms.  None of these was
+like it, though it had something of them all, with, added, the sourness
+of chemical waste and the poisonous effluvium of the bilge of a water-
+logged ship whereon a multitude of rats had been drowned.
+
+Then, quite unexpectedly, the negro noticed the presence of a third
+person--Adam Salton!  He pulled out a pistol and shot at him, happily
+missing.  Adam was himself usually a quick shot, but this time his mind
+had been on something else and he was not ready.  However, he was quick
+to carry out an intention, and he was not a coward.  In another moment
+both men were in grips.  Beside them was the dark well-hole, with that
+horrid effluvium stealing up from its mysterious depths.
+
+Adam and Oolanga both had pistols; Lady Arabella, who had not one, was
+probably the most ready of them all in the theory of shooting, but that
+being impossible, she made her effort in another way.  Gliding forward,
+she tried to seize the African; but he eluded her grasp, just missing, in
+doing so, falling into the mysterious hole.  As he swayed back to firm
+foothold, he turned his own gun on her and shot.  Instinctively Adam
+leaped at his assailant; clutching at each other, they tottered on the
+very brink.
+
+Lady Arabella's anger, now fully awake, was all for Oolanga.  She moved
+towards him with her hands extended, and had just seized him when the
+catch of the locked box--due to some movement from within--flew open, and
+the king-cobra-killer flew at her with a venomous fury impossible to
+describe.  As it seized her throat, she caught hold of it, and, with a
+fury superior to its own, tore it in two just as if it had been a sheet
+of paper.  The strength used for such an act must have been terrific.  In
+an instant, it seemed to spout blood and entrails, and was hurled into
+the well-hole.  In another instant she had seized Oolanga, and with a
+swift rush had drawn him, her white arms encircling him, down with her
+into the gaping aperture.
+
+Adam saw a medley of green and red lights blaze in a whirling circle, and
+as it sank down into the well, a pair of blazing green eyes became fixed,
+sank lower and lower with frightful rapidity, and disappeared, throwing
+upward the green light which grew more and more vivid every moment.  As
+the light sank into the noisome depths, there came a shriek which chilled
+Adam's blood--a prolonged agony of pain and terror which seemed to have
+no end.
+
+Adam Salton felt that he would never be able to free his mind from the
+memory of those dreadful moments.  The gloom which surrounded that
+horrible charnel pit, which seemed to go down to the very bowels of the
+earth, conveyed from far down the sights and sounds of the nethermost
+hell.  The ghastly fate of the African as he sank down to his terrible
+doom, his black face growing grey with terror, his white eyeballs, now
+like veined bloodstone, rolling in the helpless extremity of fear.  The
+mysterious green light was in itself a milieu of horror.  And through it
+all the awful cry came up from that fathomless pit, whose entrance was
+flooded with spots of fresh blood.  Even the death of the fearless little
+snake-killer--so fierce, so frightful, as if stained with a ferocity
+which told of no living force above earth, but only of the devils of the
+pit--was only an incident.  Adam was in a state of intellectual tumult,
+which had no parallel in his experience.  He tried to rush away from the
+horrible place; even the baleful green light, thrown up through the
+gloomy well-shaft, was dying away as its source sank deeper into the
+primeval ooze.  The darkness was closing in on him in overwhelming
+density--darkness in such a place and with such a memory of it!
+
+He made a wild rush forward--slipt on the steps in some sticky, acrid-
+smelling mass that felt and smelt like blood, and, falling forward, felt
+his way into the inner room, where the well-shaft was not.
+
+Then he rubbed his eyes in sheer amazement.  Up the stone steps from the
+narrow door by which he had entered, glided the white-clad figure of Lady
+Arabella, the only colour to be seen on her being blood-marks on her face
+and hands and throat.  Otherwise, she was calm and unruffled, as when
+earlier she stood aside for him to pass in through the narrow iron door.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX--AN ENEMY IN THE DARK
+
+
+Adam Salton went for a walk before returning to Lesser Hill; he felt that
+it might be well, not only to steady his nerves, shaken by the horrible
+scene, but to get his thoughts into some sort of order, so as to be ready
+to enter on the matter with Sir Nathaniel.  He was a little embarrassed
+as to telling his uncle, for affairs had so vastly progressed beyond his
+original view that he felt a little doubtful as to what would be the old
+gentleman's attitude when he should hear of the strange events for the
+first time.  Mr. Salton would certainly not be satisfied at being treated
+as an outsider with regard to such things, most of which had points of
+contact with the inmates of his own house.  It was with an immense sense
+of relief that Adam heard that his uncle had telegraphed to the
+housekeeper that he was detained by business at Walsall, where he would
+remain for the night; and that he would be back in the morning in time
+for lunch.
+
+When Adam got home after his walk, he found Sir Nathaniel just going to
+bed.  He did not say anything to him then of what had happened, but
+contented himself with arranging that they would walk together in the
+early morning, as he had much to say that would require serious
+attention.
+
+Strangely enough he slept well, and awoke at dawn with his mind clear and
+his nerves in their usual unshaken condition.  The maid brought up, with
+his early morning cup of tea, a note which had been found in the letter-
+box.  It was from Lady Arabella, and was evidently intended to put him on
+his guard as to what he should say about the previous evening.
+
+He read it over carefully several times, before he was satisfied that he
+had taken in its full import.
+
+   "DEAR MR. SALTON,
+
+   "I cannot go to bed until I have written to you, so you must forgive
+   me if I disturb you, and at an unseemly time.  Indeed, you must also
+   forgive me if, in trying to do what is right, I err in saying too much
+   or too little.  The fact is that I am quite upset and unnerved by all
+   that has happened in this terrible night.  I find it difficult even to
+   write; my hands shake so that they are not under control, and I am
+   trembling all over with memory of the horrors we saw enacted before
+   our eyes.  I am grieved beyond measure that I should be, however
+   remotely, a cause of this horror coming on you.  Forgive me if you
+   can, and do not think too hardly of me.  This I ask with confidence,
+   for since we shared together the danger--the very pangs--of death, I
+   feel that we should be to one another something more than mere
+   friends, that I may lean on you and trust you, assured that your
+   sympathy and pity are for me.  You really must let me thank you for
+   the friendliness, the help, the confidence, the real aid at a time of
+   deadly danger and deadly fear which you showed me.  That awful man--I
+   shall see him for ever in my dreams.  His black, malignant face will
+   shut out all memory of sunshine and happiness.  I shall eternally see
+   his evil eyes as he threw himself into that well-hole in a vain effort
+   to escape from the consequences of his own misdoing.  The more I think
+   of it, the more apparent it seems to me that he had premeditated the
+   whole thing--of course, except his own horrible death.
+
+   "Perhaps you have noticed a fur collar I occasionally wear.  It is one
+   of my most valued treasures--an ermine collar studded with emeralds.  I
+   had often seen the nigger's eyes gleam covetously when he looked at
+   it.  Unhappily, I wore it yesterday.  That may have been the cause
+   that lured the poor man to his doom.  On the very brink of the abyss
+   he tore the collar from my neck--that was the last I saw of him.  When
+   he sank into the hole, I was rushing to the iron door, which I pulled
+   behind me.  When I heard that soul-sickening yell, which marked his
+   disappearance in the chasm, I was more glad than I can say that my
+   eyes were spared the pain and horror which my ears had to endure.
+
+   "When I tore myself out of the negro's grasp as he sank into the well-
+   hole; I realised what freedom meant.  Freedom!  Freedom!  Not only
+   from that noisome prison-house, which has now such a memory, but from
+   the more noisome embrace of that hideous monster.  Whilst I live, I
+   shall always thank you for my freedom.  A woman must sometimes express
+   her gratitude; otherwise it becomes too great to bear.  I am not a
+   sentimental girl, who merely likes to thank a man; I am a woman who
+   knows all, of bad as well as good, that life can give.  I have known
+   what it is to love and to lose.  But you must not let me bring any
+   unhappiness into your life.  I must live on--as I have lived--alone,
+   and, in addition, bear with other woes the memory of this latest
+   insult and horror.  In the meantime, I must get away as quickly as
+   possible from Diana's Grove.  In the morning I shall go up to town,
+   where I shall remain for a week--I cannot stay longer, as business
+   affairs demand my presence here.  I think, however, that a week in the
+   rush of busy London, surrounded with multitudes of commonplace people,
+   will help to soften--I cannot expect total obliteration--the terrible
+   images of the bygone night.  When I can sleep easily--which will be, I
+   hope, after a day or two--I shall be fit to return home and take up
+   again the burden which will, I suppose, always be with me.
+
+   "I shall be most happy to see you on my return--or earlier, if my good
+   fortune sends you on any errand to London.  I shall stay at the
+   Mayfair Hotel.  In that busy spot we may forget some of the dangers
+   and horrors we have shared together.  Adieu, and thank you, again and
+   again, for all your kindness and consideration to me.
+
+   "ARABELLA MARSH."
+
+Adam was surprised by this effusive epistle, but he determined to say
+nothing of it to Sir Nathaniel until he should have thought it well over.
+When Adam met Sir Nathaniel at breakfast, he was glad that he had taken
+time to turn things over in his mind.  The result had been that not only
+was he familiar with the facts in all their bearings, but he had already
+so far differentiated them that he was able to arrange them in his own
+mind according to their values.  Breakfast had been a silent function, so
+it did not interfere in any way with the process of thought.
+
+So soon as the door was closed, Sir Nathaniel began:
+
+"I see, Adam, that something has occurred, and that you have much to tell
+me."
+
+"That is so, sir.  I suppose I had better begin by telling you all I
+know--all that has happened since I left you yesterday?"
+
+Accordingly Adam gave him details of all that had happened during the
+previous evening.  He confined himself rigidly to the narration of
+circumstances, taking care not to colour events by any comment of his
+own, or any opinion of the meaning of things which he did not fully
+understand.  At first, Sir Nathaniel seemed disposed to ask questions,
+but shortly gave this up when he recognised that the narration was
+concise and self-explanatory.  Thenceforth, he contented himself with
+quick looks and glances, easily interpreted, or by some acquiescent
+motions of his hands, when such could be convenient, to emphasise his
+idea of the correctness of any inference.  Until Adam ceased speaking,
+having evidently come to an end of what he had to say with regard to this
+section of his story, the elder man made no comment whatever.  Even when
+Adam took from his pocket Lady Arabella's letter, with the manifest
+intention of reading it, he did not make any comment.  Finally, when Adam
+folded up the letter and put it, in its envelope, back in his pocket, as
+an intimation that he had now quite finished, the old diplomatist
+carefully made a few notes in his pocket-book.
+
+"Your narrative, my dear Adam, is altogether admirable.  I think I may
+now take it that we are both well versed in the actual facts, and that
+our conference had better take the shape of a mutual exchange of ideas.
+Let us both ask questions as they may arise; and I do not doubt that we
+shall arrive at some enlightening conclusions."
+
+"Will you kindly begin, sir?  I do not doubt that, with your longer
+experience, you will be able to dissipate some of the fog which envelops
+certain of the things which we have to consider."
+
+"I hope so, my dear boy.  For a beginning, then, let me say that Lady
+Arabella's letter makes clear some things which she intended--and also
+some things which she did not intend.  But, before I begin to draw
+deductions, let me ask you a few questions.  Adam, are you heart-whole,
+quite heart-whole, in the matter of Lady Arabella?"
+
+His companion answered at once, each looking the other straight in the
+eyes during question and answer.
+
+"Lady Arabella, sir, is a charming woman, and I should have deemed it a
+privilege to meet her--to talk to her--even--since I am in the
+confessional--to flirt a little with her.  But if you mean to ask if my
+affections are in any way engaged, I can emphatically answer 'No!'--as
+indeed you will understand when presently I give you the reason.  Apart
+from that, there are the unpleasant details we discussed the other day."
+
+"Could you--would you mind giving me the reason now?  It will help us to
+understand what is before us, in the way of difficulty."
+
+"Certainly, sir.  My reason, on which I can fully depend, is that I love
+another woman!"
+
+"That clinches it.  May I offer my good wishes, and, I hope, my
+congratulations?"
+
+"I am proud of your good wishes, sir, and I thank you for them.  But it
+is too soon for congratulations--the lady does not even know my hopes
+yet.  Indeed, I hardly knew them myself, as definite, till this moment."
+
+"I take it then, Adam, that at the right time I may be allowed to know
+who the lady is?"
+
+Adam laughed a low, sweet laugh, such as ripples from a happy heart.
+
+"There need not be an hour's, a minute's delay.  I shall be glad to share
+my secret with you, sir.  The lady, sir, whom I am so happy as to love,
+and in whom my dreams of life-long happiness are centred, is Mimi
+Watford!"
+
+"Then, my dear Adam, I need not wait to offer congratulations.  She is
+indeed a very charming young lady.  I do not think I ever saw a girl who
+united in such perfection the qualities of strength of character and
+sweetness of disposition.  With all my heart, I congratulate you.  Then I
+may take it that my question as to your heart-wholeness is answered in
+the affirmative?"
+
+"Yes; and now, sir, may I ask in turn why the question?"
+
+"Certainly!  I asked because it seems to me that we are coming to a point
+where my questions might be painful to you."
+
+"It is not merely that I love Mimi, but I have reason to look on Lady
+Arabella as her enemy," Adam continued.
+
+"Her enemy?"
+
+"Yes.  A rank and unscrupulous enemy who is bent on her destruction."
+
+Sir Nathaniel went to the door, looked outside it and returned, locking
+it carefully behind him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX--METABOLISM
+
+
+"Am I looking grave?" asked Sir Nathaniel inconsequently when he
+re-entered the room.
+
+"You certainly are, sir."
+
+"We little thought when first we met that we should be drawn into such a
+vortex.  Already we are mixed up in robbery, and probably murder, but--a
+thousand times worse than all the crimes in the calendar--in an affair of
+ghastly mystery which has no bottom and no end--with forces of the most
+unnerving kind, which had their origin in an age when the world was
+different from the world which we know.  We are going back to the origin
+of superstition--to an age when dragons tore each other in their slime.
+We must fear nothing--no conclusion, however improbable, almost
+impossible it may be.  Life and death is hanging on our judgment, not
+only for ourselves, but for others whom we love.  Remember, I count on
+you as I hope you count on me."
+
+"I do, with all confidence."
+
+"Then," said Sir Nathaniel, "let us think justly and boldly and fear
+nothing, however terrifying it may seem.  I suppose I am to take as exact
+in every detail your account of all the strange things which happened
+whilst you were in Diana's Grove?"
+
+"So far as I know, yes.  Of course I may be mistaken in recollection of
+some detail or another, but I am certain that in the main what I have
+said is correct."
+
+"You feel sure that you saw Lady Arabella seize the negro round the neck,
+and drag him down with her into the hole?"
+
+"Absolutely certain, sir, otherwise I should have gone to her
+assistance."
+
+"We have, then, an account of what happened from an eye-witness whom we
+trust--that is yourself.  We have also another account, written by Lady
+Arabella under her own hand.  These two accounts do not agree.  Therefore
+we must take it that one of the two is lying."
+
+"Apparently, sir."
+
+"And that Lady Arabella is the liar!"
+
+"Apparently--as I am not."
+
+"We must, therefore, try to find a reason for her lying.  She has nothing
+to fear from Oolanga, who is dead.  Therefore the only reason which could
+actuate her would be to convince someone else that she was blameless.
+This 'someone' could not be you, for you had the evidence of your own
+eyes.  There was no one else present; therefore it must have been an
+absent person."
+
+"That seems beyond dispute, sir."
+
+"There is only one other person whose good opinion she could wish to
+keep--Edgar Caswall.  He is the only one who fills the bill.  Her lies
+point to other things besides the death of the African.  She evidently
+wanted it to be accepted that his falling into the well was his own act.
+I cannot suppose that she expected to convince you, the eye-witness; but
+if she wished later on to spread the story, it was wise of her to try to
+get your acceptance of it."
+
+"That is so!"
+
+"Then there were other matters of untruth.  That, for instance, of the
+ermine collar embroidered with emeralds.  If an understandable reason be
+required for this, it would be to draw attention away from the green
+lights which were seen in the room, and especially in the well-hole.  Any
+unprejudiced person would accept the green lights to be the eyes of a
+great snake, such as tradition pointed to living in the well-hole.  In
+fine, therefore, Lady Arabella wanted the general belief to be that there
+was no snake of the kind in Diana's Grove.  For my own part, I don't
+believe in a partial liar--this art does not deal in veneer; a liar is a
+liar right through.  Self-interest may prompt falsity of the tongue; but
+if one prove to be a liar, nothing that he says can ever be believed.
+This leads us to the conclusion that because she said or inferred that
+there was no snake, we should look for one--and expect to find it, too.
+
+"Now let me digress.  I live, and have for many years lived, in
+Derbyshire, a county more celebrated for its caves than any other county
+in England.  I have been through them all, and am familiar with every
+turn of them; as also with other great caves in Kentucky, in France, in
+Germany, and a host of other places--in many of these are tremendously
+deep caves of narrow aperture, which are valued by intrepid explorers,
+who descend narrow gullets of abysmal depth--and sometimes never return.
+In many of the caverns in the Peak I am convinced that some of the
+smaller passages were used in primeval times as the lairs of some of the
+great serpents of legend and tradition.  It may have been that such
+caverns were formed in the usual geologic way--bubbles or flaws in the
+earth's crust--which were later used by the monsters of the period of the
+young world.  It may have been, of course, that some of them were worn
+originally by water; but in time they all found a use when suitable for
+living monsters.
+
+"This brings us to another point, more difficult to accept and understand
+than any other requiring belief in a base not usually accepted, or indeed
+entered on--whether such abnormal growths could have ever changed in
+their nature.  Some day the study of metabolism may progress so far as to
+enable us to accept structural changes proceeding from an intellectual or
+moral base.  We may lean towards a belief that great animal strength may
+be a sound base for changes of all sorts.  If this be so, what could be a
+more fitting subject than primeval monsters whose strength was such as to
+allow a survival of thousands of years?  We do not know yet if brain can
+increase and develop independently of other parts of the living
+structure.
+
+"After all, the mediaeval belief in the Philosopher's Stone which could
+transmute metals, has its counterpart in the accepted theory of
+metabolism which changes living tissue.  In an age of investigation like
+our own, when we are returning to science as the base of wonders--almost
+of miracles--we should be slow to refuse to accept facts, however
+impossible they may seem to be.
+
+"Let us suppose a monster of the early days of the world--a dragon of the
+prime--of vast age running into thousands of years, to whom had been
+conveyed in some way--it matters not--a brain just sufficient for the
+beginning of growth.  Suppose the monster to be of incalculable size and
+of a strength quite abnormal--a veritable incarnation of animal strength.
+Suppose this animal is allowed to remain in one place, thus being removed
+from accidents of interrupted development; might not, would not this
+creature, in process of time--ages, if necessary--have that rudimentary
+intelligence developed?  There is no impossibility in this; it is only
+the natural process of evolution.  In the beginning, the instincts of
+animals are confined to alimentation, self-protection, and the
+multiplication of their species.  As time goes on and the needs of life
+become more complex, power follows need.  We have been long accustomed to
+consider growth as applied almost exclusively to size in its various
+aspects.  But Nature, who has no doctrinaire ideas, may equally apply it
+to concentration.  A developing thing may expand in any given way or
+form.  Now, it is a scientific law that increase implies gain and loss of
+various kinds; what a thing gains in one direction it may lose in
+another.  May it not be that Mother Nature may deliberately encourage
+decrease as well as increase--that it may be an axiom that what is gained
+in concentration is lost in size?  Take, for instance, monsters that
+tradition has accepted and localised, such as the Worm of Lambton or that
+of Spindleston Heugh.  If such a creature were, by its own process of
+metabolism, to change much of its bulk for intellectual growth, we should
+at once arrive at a new class of creature--more dangerous, perhaps, than
+the world has ever had any experience of--a force which can think, which
+has no soul and no morals, and therefore no acceptance of responsibility.
+A snake would be a good illustration of this, for it is cold-blooded, and
+therefore removed from the temptations which often weaken or restrict
+warm-blooded creatures.  If, for instance, the Worm of Lambton--if such
+ever existed--were guided to its own ends by an organised intelligence
+capable of expansion, what form of creature could we imagine which would
+equal it in potentialities of evil?  Why, such a being would devastate a
+whole country.  Now, all these things require much thought, and we want
+to apply the knowledge usefully, and we should therefore be exact.  Would
+it not be well to resume the subject later in the day?"
+
+"I quite agree, sir.  I am in a whirl already; and want to attend
+carefully to what you say; so that I may try to digest it."
+
+Both men seemed fresher and better for the "easy," and when they met in
+the afternoon each of them had something to contribute to the general
+stock of information.  Adam, who was by nature of a more militant
+disposition than his elderly friend, was glad to see that the conference
+at once assumed a practical trend.  Sir Nathaniel recognised this, and,
+like an old diplomatist, turned it to present use.
+
+"Tell me now, Adam, what is the outcome, in your own mind, of our
+conversation?"
+
+"That the whole difficulty already assumes practical shape; but with
+added dangers, that at first I did not imagine."
+
+"What is the practical shape, and what are the added dangers?  I am not
+disputing, but only trying to clear my own ideas by the consideration of
+yours--"
+
+So Adam went on:
+
+"In the past, in the early days of the world, there were monsters who
+were so vast that they could exist for thousands of years.  Some of them
+must have overlapped the Christian era.  They may have progressed
+intellectually in process of time.  If they had in any way so progressed,
+or even got the most rudimentary form of brain, they would be the most
+dangerous things that ever were in the world.  Tradition says that one of
+these monsters lived in the Marsh of the East, and came up to a cave in
+Diana's Grove, which was also called the Lair of the White Worm.  Such
+creatures may have grown down as well as up.  They _may_ have grown into,
+or something like, human beings.  Lady Arabella March is of snake nature.
+She has committed crimes to our knowledge.  She retains something of the
+vast strength of her primal being--can see in the dark--has the eyes of a
+snake.  She used the nigger, and then dragged him through the snake's
+hole down to the swamp; she is intent on evil, and hates some one we
+love.  Result . . . "
+
+"Yes, the result?"
+
+"First, that Mimi Watford should be taken away at once--then--"
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"The monster must be destroyed."
+
+"Bravo!  That is a true and fearless conclusion.  At whatever cost, it
+must be carried out."
+
+"At once?"
+
+"Soon, at all events.  That creature's very existence is a danger.  Her
+presence in this neighbourhood makes the danger immediate."
+
+As he spoke, Sir Nathaniel's mouth hardened and his eyebrows came down
+till they met.  There was no doubting his concurrence in the resolution,
+or his readiness to help in carrying it out.  But he was an elderly man
+with much experience and knowledge of law and diplomacy.  It seemed to
+him to be a stern duty to prevent anything irrevocable taking place till
+it had been thought out and all was ready.  There were all sorts of legal
+cruxes to be thought out, not only regarding the taking of life, even of
+a monstrosity in human form, but also of property.  Lady Arabella, be she
+woman or snake or devil, owned the ground she moved in, according to
+British law, and the law is jealous and swift to avenge wrongs done
+within its ken.  All such difficulties should be--must be--avoided for
+Mr. Salton's sake, for Adam's own sake, and, most of all, for Mimi
+Watford's sake.
+
+Before he spoke again, Sir Nathaniel had made up his mind that he must
+try to postpone decisive action until the circumstances on which they
+depended--which, after all, were only problematical--should have been
+tested satisfactorily, one way or another.  When he did speak, Adam at
+first thought that his friend was wavering in his intention, or "funking"
+the responsibility.  However, his respect for Sir Nathaniel was so great
+that he would not act, or even come to a conclusion on a vital point,
+without his sanction.
+
+He came close and whispered in his ear:
+
+"We will prepare our plans to combat and destroy this horrible menace,
+after we have cleared up some of the more baffling points.  Meanwhile, we
+must wait for the night--I hear my uncle's footsteps echoing down the
+hall."
+
+Sir Nathaniel nodded his approval.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI--GREEN LIGHT
+
+
+When old Mr. Salton had retired for the night, Adam and Sir Nathaniel
+returned to the study.  Things went with great regularity at Lesser Hill,
+so they knew that there would be no interruption to their talk.
+
+When their cigars were lighted, Sir Nathaniel began.
+
+"I hope, Adam, that you do not think me either slack or changeable of
+purpose.  I mean to go through this business to the bitter end--whatever
+it may be.  Be satisfied that my first care is, and shall be, the
+protection of Mimi Watford.  To that I am pledged; my dear boy, we who
+are interested are all in the same danger.  That semi-human monster out
+of the pit hates and means to destroy us all--you and me certainly, and
+probably your uncle.  I wanted especially to talk with you to-night, for
+I cannot help thinking that the time is fast coming--if it has not come
+already--when we must take your uncle into our confidence.  It was one
+thing when fancied evils threatened, but now he is probably marked for
+death, and it is only right that he should know all."
+
+"I am with you, sir.  Things have changed since we agreed to keep him out
+of the trouble.  Now we dare not; consideration for his feelings might
+cost his life.  It is a duty--and no light or pleasant one, either.  I
+have not a shadow of doubt that he will want to be one with us in this.
+But remember, we are his guests; his name, his honour, have to be thought
+of as well as his safety."
+
+"All shall be as you wish, Adam.  And now as to what we are to do?  We
+cannot murder Lady Arabella off-hand.  Therefore we shall have to put
+things in order for the killing, and in such a way that we cannot be
+taxed with a crime."
+
+"It seems to me, sir, that we are in an exceedingly tight place.  Our
+first difficulty is to know where to begin.  I never thought this
+fighting an antediluvian monster would be such a complicated job.  This
+one is a woman, with all a woman's wit, combined with the heartlessness
+of a _cocotte_.  She has the strength and impregnability of a diplodocus.
+We may be sure that in the fight that is before us there will be no
+semblance of fair-play.  Also that our unscrupulous opponent will not
+betray herself!"
+
+"That is so--but being feminine, she will probably over-reach herself.
+Now, Adam, it strikes me that, as we have to protect ourselves and others
+against feminine nature, our strong game will be to play our masculine
+against her feminine.  Perhaps we had better sleep on it.  She is a thing
+of the night; and the night may give us some ideas."
+
+So they both turned in.
+
+Adam knocked at Sir Nathaniel's door in the grey of the morning, and, on
+being bidden, came into the room.  He had several letters in his hand.
+Sir Nathaniel sat up in bed.
+
+"Well!"
+
+"I should like to read you a few letters, but, of course, I shall not
+send them unless you approve.  In fact"--with a smile and a blush--"there
+are several things which I want to do; but I hold my hand and my tongue
+till I have your approval."
+
+"Go on!" said the other kindly.  "Tell me all, and count at any rate on
+my sympathy, and on my approval and help if I can see my way."
+
+Accordingly Adam proceeded:
+
+"When I told you the conclusions at which I had arrived, I put in the
+foreground that Mimi Watford should, for the sake of her own safety, be
+removed--and that the monster which had wrought all the harm should be
+destroyed."
+
+"Yes, that is so."
+
+"To carry this into practice, sir, one preliminary is required--unless
+harm of another kind is to be faced.  Mimi should have some protector
+whom all the world would recognise.  The only form recognised by
+convention is marriage!"
+
+Sir Nathaniel smiled in a fatherly way.
+
+"To marry, a husband is required.  And that husband should be you."
+
+"Yes, yes."
+
+"And the marriage should be immediate and secret--or, at least, not
+spoken of outside ourselves.  Would the young lady be agreeable to that
+proceeding?"
+
+"I do not know, sir!"
+
+"Then how are we to proceed?"
+
+"I suppose that we--or one of us--must ask her."
+
+"Is this a sudden idea, Adam, a sudden resolution?"
+
+"A sudden resolution, sir, but not a sudden idea.  If she agrees, all is
+well and good.  The sequence is obvious."
+
+"And it is to be kept a secret amongst ourselves?"
+
+"I want no secret, sir, except for Mimi's good.  For myself, I should
+like to shout it from the house-tops!  But we must be discreet; untimely
+knowledge to our enemy might work incalculable harm."
+
+"And how would you suggest, Adam, that we could combine the momentous
+question with secrecy?"
+
+Adam grew red and moved uneasily.
+
+"Someone must ask her--as soon as possible!"
+
+"And that someone?"
+
+"I thought that you, sir, would be so good!"
+
+"God bless my soul!  This is a new kind of duty to take on--at my time of
+life.  Adam, I hope you know that you can count on me to help in any way
+I can!"
+
+"I have already counted on you, sir, when I ventured to make such a
+suggestion.  I can only ask," he added, "that you will be more than ever
+kind to me--to us--and look on the painful duty as a voluntary act of
+grace, prompted by kindness and affection."
+
+"Painful duty!"
+
+"Yes," said Adam boldly.  "Painful to you, though to me it would be all
+joyful."
+
+"It is a strange job for an early morning!  Well, we all live and learn.
+I suppose the sooner I go the better.  You had better write a line for me
+to take with me.  For, you see, this is to be a somewhat unusual
+transaction, and it may be embarrassing to the lady, even to myself.  So
+we ought to have some sort of warrant, something to show that we have
+been mindful of her feelings.  It will not do to take acquiescence for
+granted--although we act for her good."
+
+"Sir Nathaniel, you are a true friend; I am sure that both Mimi and I
+shall be grateful to you for all our lives--however long they may be!"
+
+So the two talked it over and agreed as to points to be borne in mind by
+the ambassador.  It was striking ten when Sir Nathaniel left the house,
+Adam seeing him quietly off.
+
+As the young man followed him with wistful eyes--almost jealous of the
+privilege which his kind deed was about to bring him--he felt that his
+own heart was in his friend's breast.
+
+The memory of that morning was like a dream to all those concerned in it.
+Sir Nathaniel had a confused recollection of detail and sequence, though
+the main facts stood out in his memory boldly and clearly.  Adam Salton's
+recollection was of an illimitable wait, filled with anxiety, hope, and
+chagrin, all dominated by a sense of the slow passage of time and
+accompanied by vague fears.  Mimi could not for a long time think at all,
+or recollect anything, except that Adam loved her and was saving her from
+a terrible danger.  When she had time to think, later on, she wondered
+when she had any ignorance of the fact that Adam loved her, and that she
+loved him with all her heart.  Everything, every recollection however
+small, every feeling, seemed to fit into those elemental facts as though
+they had all been moulded together.  The main and crowning recollection
+was her saying goodbye to Sir Nathaniel, and entrusting to him loving
+messages, straight from her heart, to Adam Salton, and of his bearing
+when--with an impulse which she could not check--she put her lips to his
+and kissed him.  Later, when she was alone and had time to think, it was
+a passing grief to her that she would have to be silent, for a time, to
+Lilla on the happy events of that strange mission.
+
+She had, of course, agreed to keep all secret until Adam should give her
+leave to speak.
+
+The advice and assistance of Sir Nathaniel was a great help to Adam in
+carrying out his idea of marrying Mimi Watford without publicity.  He
+went with him to London, and, with his influence, the young man obtained
+the license of the Archbishop of Canterbury for a private marriage.  Sir
+Nathaniel then persuaded old Mr. Salton to allow his nephew to spend a
+few weeks with him at Doom Tower, and it was here that Mimi became Adam's
+wife.  But that was only the first step in their plans; before going
+further, however, Adam took his bride off to the Isle of Man.  He wished
+to place a stretch of sea between Mimi and the White Worm, while things
+matured.  On their return, Sir Nathaniel met them and drove them at once
+to Doom, taking care to avoid any one that he knew on the journey.
+
+Sir Nathaniel had taken care to have the doors and windows shut and
+locked--all but the door used for their entry.  The shutters were up and
+the blinds down.  Moreover, heavy curtains were drawn across the windows.
+When Adam commented on this, Sir Nathaniel said in a whisper:
+
+"Wait till we are alone, and I'll tell you why this is done; in the
+meantime not a word or a sign.  You will approve when we have had a talk
+together."
+
+They said no more on the subject till after dinner, when they were
+ensconced in Sir Nathaniel's study, which was on the top storey.  Doom
+Tower was a lofty structure, situated on an eminence high up in the Peak.
+The top commanded a wide prospect, ranging from the hills above the
+Ribble to the near side of the Brow, which marked the northern bound of
+ancient Mercia.  It was of the early Norman period, less than a century
+younger than Castra Regis.  The windows of the study were barred and
+locked, and heavy dark curtains closed them in.  When this was done not a
+gleam of light from the tower could be seen from outside.
+
+When they were alone, Sir Nathaniel explained that he had taken his old
+friend, Mr. Salton, into full confidence, and that in future all would
+work together.
+
+"It is important for you to be extremely careful.  In spite of the fact
+that our marriage was kept secret, as also your temporary absence, both
+are known."
+
+"How?  To whom?"
+
+"How, I know not; but I am beginning to have an idea."
+
+"To her?" asked Adam, in momentary consternation.
+
+Sir Nathaniel shivered perceptibly.
+
+"The White Worm--yes!"
+
+Adam noticed that from now on, his friend never spoke of Lady Arabella
+otherwise, except when he wished to divert the suspicion of others.
+
+Sir Nathaniel switched off the electric light, and when the room was
+pitch dark, he came to Adam, took him by the hand, and led him to a seat
+set in the southern window.  Then he softly drew back a piece of the
+curtain and motioned his companion to look out.
+
+Adam did so, and immediately shrank back as though his eyes had opened on
+pressing danger.  His companion set his mind at rest by saying in a low
+voice:
+
+"It is all right; you may speak, but speak low.  There is no danger
+here--at present!"
+
+Adam leaned forward, taking care, however, not to press his face against
+the glass.  What he saw would not under ordinary circumstances have
+caused concern to anybody.  With his special knowledge, it was
+appalling--though the night was now so dark that in reality there was
+little to be seen.
+
+On the western side of the tower stood a grove of old trees, of forest
+dimensions.  They were not grouped closely, but stood a little apart from
+each other, producing the effect of a row widely planted.  Over the tops
+of them was seen a green light, something like the danger signal at a
+railway-crossing.  It seemed at first quite still; but presently, when
+Adam's eye became accustomed to it, he could see that it moved as if
+trembling.  This at once recalled to Adam's mind the light quivering
+above the well-hole in the darkness of that inner room at Diana's Grove,
+Oolanga's awful shriek, and the hideous black face, now grown grey with
+terror, disappearing into the impenetrable gloom of the mysterious
+orifice.  Instinctively he laid his hand on his revolver, and stood up
+ready to protect his wife.  Then, seeing that nothing happened, and that
+the light and all outside the tower remained the same, he softly pulled
+the curtain over the window.
+
+Sir Nathaniel switched on the light again, and in its comforting glow
+they began to talk freely.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII--AT CLOSE QUARTERS
+
+
+"She has diabolical cunning," said Sir Nathaniel.  "Ever since you left,
+she has ranged along the Brow and wherever you were accustomed to
+frequent.  I have not heard whence the knowledge of your movements came
+to her, nor have I been able to learn any data whereon to found an
+opinion.  She seems to have heard both of your marriage and your absence;
+but I gather, by inference, that she does not actually know where you and
+Mimi are, or of your return.  So soon as the dusk fails, she goes out on
+her rounds, and before dawn covers the whole ground round the Brow, and
+away up into the heart of the Peak.  The White Worm, in her own proper
+shape, certainly has great facilities for the business on which she is
+now engaged.  She can look into windows of any ordinary kind.  Happily,
+this house is beyond her reach, if she wishes--as she manifestly does--to
+remain unrecognised.  But, even at this height, it is wise to show no
+lights, lest she might learn something of our presence or absence."
+
+"Would it not be well, sir, if one of us could see this monster in her
+real shape at close quarters?  I am willing to run the risk--for I take
+it there would be no slight risk in the doing.  I don't suppose anyone of
+our time has seen her close and lived to tell the tale."
+
+Sir Nathaniel held up an expostulatory hand.
+
+"Good God, lad, what are you suggesting?  Think of your wife, and all
+that is at stake."
+
+"It is of Mimi that I think--for her sake that I am willing to risk
+whatever is to be risked."
+
+Adam's young bride was proud of her man, but she blanched at the thought
+of the ghastly White Worm.  Adam saw this and at once reassured her.
+
+"So long as her ladyship does not know whereabout I am, I shall have as
+much safety as remains to us; bear in mind, my darling, that we cannot be
+too careful."
+
+Sir Nathaniel realised that Adam was right; the White Worm had no
+supernatural powers and could not harm them until she discovered their
+hiding place.  It was agreed, therefore, that the two men should go
+together.
+
+When the two men slipped out by the back door of the house, they walked
+cautiously along the avenue which trended towards the west.  Everything
+was pitch dark--so dark that at times they had to feel their way by the
+palings and tree-trunks.  They could still see, seemingly far in front of
+them and high up, the baleful light which at the height and distance
+seemed like a faint line.  As they were now on the level of the ground,
+the light seemed infinitely higher than it had from the top of the tower.
+At the sight Adam's heart fell; the danger of the desperate enterprise
+which he had undertaken burst upon him.  But this feeling was shortly
+followed by another which restored him to himself--a fierce loathing, and
+a desire to kill, such as he had never experienced before.
+
+They went on for some distance on a level road, fairly wide, from which
+the green light was visible.  Here Sir Nathaniel spoke softly, placing
+his lips to Adam's ear for safety.
+
+"We know nothing whatever of this creature's power of hearing or
+smelling, though I presume that both are of no great strength.  As to
+seeing, we may presume the opposite, but in any case we must try to keep
+in the shade behind the tree-trunks.  The slightest error would be fatal
+to us."
+
+Adam only nodded, in case there should be any chance of the monster
+seeing the movement.
+
+After a time that seemed interminable, they emerged from the circling
+wood.  It was like coming out into sunlight by comparison with the misty
+blackness which had been around them.  There was light enough to see by,
+though not sufficient to distinguish things at a distance.  Adam's eyes
+sought the green light in the sky.  It was still in about the same place,
+but its surroundings were more visible.  It was now at the summit of what
+seemed to be a long white pole, near the top of which were two pendant
+white masses, like rudimentary arms or fins.  The green light, strangely
+enough, did not seem lessened by the surrounding starlight, but had a
+clearer effect and a deeper green.  Whilst they were carefully regarding
+this--Adam with the aid of an opera-glass--their nostrils were assailed
+by a horrid stench, something like that which rose from the well-hole in
+Diana's Grove.
+
+By degrees, as their eyes got the right focus, they saw an immense
+towering mass that seemed snowy white.  It was tall and thin.  The lower
+part was hidden by the trees which lay between, but they could follow the
+tall white shaft and the duplicate green lights which topped it.  As they
+looked there was a movement--the shaft seemed to bend, and the line of
+green light descended amongst the trees.  They could see the green light
+twinkle as it passed between the obstructing branches.
+
+Seeing where the head of the monster was, the two men ventured a little
+further forward, and saw that the hidden mass at the base of the shaft
+was composed of vast coils of the great serpent's body, forming a base
+from which the upright mass rose.  As they looked, this lower mass moved,
+the glistening folds catching the moonlight, and they could see that the
+monster's progress was along the ground.  It was coming towards them at a
+swift pace, so they turned and ran, taking care to make as little noise
+as possible, either by their footfalls or by disturbing the undergrowth
+close to them.  They did not stop or pause till they saw before them the
+high dark tower of Doom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII--IN THE ENEMY'S HOUSE
+
+
+Sir Nathaniel was in the library next morning, after breakfast, when Adam
+came to him carrying a letter.
+
+"Her ladyship doesn't lose any time.  She has begun work already!"
+
+Sir Nathaniel, who was writing at a table near the window, looked up.
+
+"What is it?" said he.
+
+Adam held out the letter he was carrying.  It was in a blazoned envelope.
+
+"Ha!" said Sir Nathaniel, "from the White Worm!  I expected something of
+the kind."
+
+"But," said Adam, "how could she have known we were here?  She didn't
+know last night."
+
+"I don't think we need trouble about that, Adam.  There is so much we do
+not understand.  This is only another mystery.  Suffice it that she does
+know--perhaps it is all the better and safer for us."
+
+"How is that?" asked Adam with a puzzled look.
+
+"General process of reasoning, my boy; and the experience of some years
+in the diplomatic world.  This creature is a monster without heart or
+consideration for anything or anyone.  She is not nearly so dangerous in
+the open as when she has the dark to protect her.  Besides, we know, by
+our own experience of her movements, that for some reason she shuns
+publicity.  In spite of her vast bulk and abnormal strength, she is
+afraid to attack openly.  After all, she is only a snake and with a
+snake's nature, which is to keep low and squirm, and proceed by stealth
+and cunning.  She will never attack when she can run away, although she
+knows well that running away would probably be fatal to her.  What is the
+letter about?"
+
+Sir Nathaniel's voice was calm and self-possessed.  When he was engaged
+in any struggle of wits he was all diplomatist.
+
+"She asks Mimi and me to tea this afternoon at Diana's Grove, and hopes
+that you also will favour her."
+
+Sir Nathaniel smiled.
+
+"Please ask Mrs. Salton to accept for us all."
+
+"She means some deadly mischief.  Surely--surely it would be wiser not."
+
+"It is an old trick that we learn early in diplomacy, Adam--to fight on
+ground of your own choice.  It is true that she suggested the place on
+this occasion; but by accepting it we make it ours.  Moreover, she will
+not be able to understand our reason for doing so, and her own bad
+conscience--if she has any, bad or good--and her own fears and doubts
+will play our game for us.  No, my dear boy, let us accept, by all
+means."
+
+Adam said nothing, but silently held out his hand, which his companion
+shook: no words were necessary.
+
+When it was getting near tea-time, Mimi asked Sir Nathaniel how they were
+going.
+
+"We must make a point of going in state.  We want all possible
+publicity."  Mimi looked at him inquiringly.  "Certainly, my dear, in the
+present circumstances publicity is a part of safety.  Do not be surprised
+if, whilst we are at Diana's Grove, occasional messages come for you--for
+all or any of us."
+
+"I see!" said Mrs. Salton.  "You are taking no chances."
+
+"None, my dear.  All I have learned at foreign courts, and amongst
+civilised and uncivilised people, is going to be utilised within the next
+couple of hours."
+
+Sir Nathaniel's voice was full of seriousness, and it brought to Mimi in
+a convincing way the awful gravity of the occasion.
+
+In due course, they set out in a carriage drawn by a fine pair of horses,
+who soon devoured the few miles of their journey.  Before they came to
+the gate, Sir Nathaniel turned to Mimi.
+
+"I have arranged with Adam certain signals which may be necessary if
+certain eventualities occur.  These need be nothing to do with you
+directly.  But bear in mind that if I ask you or Adam to do anything, do
+not lose a second in the doing of it.  We must try to pass off such
+moments with an appearance of unconcern.  In all probability, nothing
+requiring such care will occur.  The White Worm will not try force,
+though she has so much of it to spare.  Whatever she may attempt to-day,
+of harm to any of us, will be in the way of secret plot.  Some other time
+she may try force, but--if I am able to judge such a thing--not to-day.
+The messengers who may ask for any of us will not be witnesses only, they
+may help to stave off danger."  Seeing query in her face, he went on: "Of
+what kind the danger may be, I know not, and cannot guess.  It will
+doubtless be some ordinary circumstance; but none the less dangerous on
+that account.  Here we are at the gate.  Now, be careful in all matters,
+however small.  To keep your head is half the battle."
+
+There were a number of men in livery in the hall when they arrived.  The
+doors of the drawing-room were thrown open, and Lady Arabella came forth
+and offered them cordial welcome.  This having been got over, Lady
+Arabella led them into another room where tea was served.
+
+Adam was acutely watchful and suspicious of everything, and saw on the
+far side of this room a panelled iron door of the same colour and
+configuration as the outer door of the room where was the well-hole
+wherein Oolanga had disappeared.  Something in the sight alarmed him, and
+he quietly stood near the door.  He made no movement, even of his eyes,
+but he could see that Sir Nathaniel was watching him intently, and, he
+fancied, with approval.
+
+They all sat near the table spread for tea, Adam still near the door.
+Lady Arabella fanned herself, complaining of heat, and told one of the
+footmen to throw all the outer doors open.
+
+Tea was in progress when Mimi suddenly started up with a look of fright
+on her face; at the same moment, the men became cognisant of a thick
+smoke which began to spread through the room--a smoke which made those
+who experienced it gasp and choke.  The footmen began to edge uneasily
+towards the inner door.  Denser and denser grew the smoke, and more acrid
+its smell.  Mimi, towards whom the draught from the open door wafted the
+smoke, rose up choking, and ran to the inner door, which she threw open
+to its fullest extent, disclosing on the outside a curtain of thin silk,
+fixed to the doorposts.  The draught from the open door swayed the thin
+silk towards her, and in her fright, she tore down the curtain, which
+enveloped her from head to foot.  Then she ran through the still open
+door, heedless of the fact that she could not see where she was going.
+Adam, followed by Sir Nathaniel, rushed forward and joined her--Adam
+catching his wife by the arm and holding her tight.  It was well that he
+did so, for just before her lay the black orifice of the well-hole,
+which, of course, she could not see with the silk curtain round her head.
+The floor was extremely slippery; something like thick oil had been
+spilled where she had to pass; and close to the edge of the hole her feet
+shot from under her, and she stumbled forward towards the well-hole.
+
+When Adam saw Mimi slip, he flung himself backward, still holding her.
+His weight told, and he dragged her up from the hole and they fell
+together on the floor outside the zone of slipperiness.  In a moment he
+had raised her up, and together they rushed out through the open door
+into the sunlight, Sir Nathaniel close behind them.  They were all pale
+except the old diplomatist, who looked both calm and cool.  It sustained
+and cheered Adam and his wife to see him thus master of himself.  Both
+managed to follow his example, to the wonderment of the footmen, who saw
+the three who had just escaped a terrible danger walking together gaily,
+as, under the guiding pressure of Sir Nathaniel's hand, they turned to re-
+enter the house.
+
+Lady Arabella, whose face had blanched to a deadly white, now resumed her
+ministrations at the tea-board as though nothing unusual had happened.
+The slop-basin was full of half-burned brown paper, over which tea had
+been poured.
+
+Sir Nathaniel had been narrowly observing his hostess, and took the first
+opportunity afforded him of whispering to Adam:
+
+"The real attack is to come--she is too quiet.  When I give my hand to
+your wife to lead her out, come with us--and caution her to hurry.  Don't
+lose a second, even if you have to make a scene.  Hs-s-s-h!"
+
+Then they resumed their places close to the table, and the servants, in
+obedience to Lady Arabella's order, brought in fresh tea.
+
+Thence on, that tea-party seemed to Adam, whose faculties were at their
+utmost intensity, like a terrible dream.  As for poor Mimi, she was so
+overwrought both with present and future fear, and with horror at the
+danger she had escaped, that her faculties were numb.  However, she was
+braced up for a trial, and she felt assured that whatever might come she
+would be able to go through with it.  Sir Nathaniel seemed just as
+usual--suave, dignified, and thoughtful--perfect master of himself.
+
+To her husband, it was evident that Mimi was ill at ease.  The way she
+kept turning her head to look around her, the quick coming and going of
+the colour of her face, her hurried breathing, alternating with periods
+of suspicious calm, were evidences of mental perturbation.  To her, the
+attitude of Lady Arabella seemed compounded of social sweetness and
+personal consideration.  It would be hard to imagine more thoughtful and
+tender kindness towards an honoured guest.
+
+When tea was over and the servants had come to clear away the cups, Lady
+Arabella, putting her arm round Mimi's waist, strolled with her into an
+adjoining room, where she collected a number of photographs which were
+scattered about, and, sitting down beside her guest, began to show them
+to her.  While she was doing this, the servants closed all the doors of
+the suite of rooms, as well as that which opened from the room
+outside--that of the well-hole into the avenue.  Suddenly, without any
+seeming cause, the light in the room began to grow dim.  Sir Nathaniel,
+who was sitting close to Mimi, rose to his feet, and, crying, "Quick!"
+caught hold of her hand and began to drag her from the room.  Adam caught
+her other hand, and between them they drew her through the outer door
+which the servants were beginning to close.  It was difficult at first to
+find the way, the darkness was so great; but to their relief when Adam
+whistled shrilly, the carriage and horses, which had been waiting in the
+angle of the avenue, dashed up.  Her husband and Sir Nathaniel
+lifted--almost threw--Mimi into the carriage.  The postillion plied whip
+and spur, and the vehicle, rocking with its speed, swept through the gate
+and tore up the road.  Behind them was a hubbub--servants rushing about,
+orders being shouted out, doors shutting, and somewhere, seemingly far
+back in the house, a strange noise.  Every nerve of the horses was
+strained as they dashed recklessly along the road.  The two men held Mimi
+between them, the arms of both of them round her as though protectingly.
+As they went, there was a sudden rise in the ground; but the horses,
+breathing heavily, dashed up it at racing speed, not slackening their
+pace when the hill fell away again, leaving them to hurry along the
+downgrade.
+
+It would be foolish to say that neither Adam nor Mimi had any fear in
+returning to Doom Tower.  Mimi felt it more keenly than her husband,
+whose nerves were harder, and who was more inured to danger.  Still she
+bore up bravely, and as usual the effort was helpful to her.  When once
+she was in the study in the top of the turret, she almost forgot the
+terrors which lay outside in the dark.  She did not attempt to peep out
+of the window; but Adam did--and saw nothing.  The moonlight showed all
+the surrounding country, but nowhere was to be observed that tremulous
+line of green light.
+
+The peaceful night had a good effect on them all; danger, being unseen,
+seemed far off.  At times it was hard to realise that it had ever been.
+With courage restored, Adam rose early and walked along the Brow, seeing
+no change in the signs of life in Castra Regis.  What he did see, to his
+wonder and concern, on his returning homeward, was Lady Arabella, in her
+tight-fitting white dress and ermine collar, but without her emeralds;
+she was emerging from the gate of Diana's Grove and walking towards the
+Castle.  Pondering on this, and trying to find some meaning in it,
+occupied his thoughts till he joined Mimi and Sir Nathaniel at breakfast.
+They began the meal in silence.  What had been had been, and was known to
+them all.  Moreover, it was not a pleasant topic.
+
+A fillip was given to the conversation when Adam told of his seeing Lady
+Arabella, on her way to Castra Regis.  They each had something to say of
+her, and of what her wishes or intentions were towards Edgar Caswall.
+Mimi spoke bitterly of her in every aspect.  She had not forgotten--and
+never would--never could--the occasion when, to harm Lilla, the woman had
+consorted even with the nigger.  As a social matter, she was disgusted
+with her for following up the rich landowner--"throwing herself at his
+head so shamelessly," was how she expressed it.  She was interested to
+know that the great kite still flew from Caswall's tower.  But beyond
+such matters she did not try to go.  The only comment she made was of
+strongly expressed surprise at her ladyship's "cheek" in ignoring her own
+criminal acts, and her impudence in taking it for granted that others had
+overlooked them also.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV--A STARTLING PROPOSITION
+
+
+The more Mimi thought over the late events, the more puzzled she was.
+What did it all mean--what could it mean, except that there was an error
+of fact somewhere.  Could it be possible that some of them--all of them
+had been mistaken, that there had been no White Worm at all?  On either
+side of her was a belief impossible of reception.  Not to believe in what
+seemed apparent was to destroy the very foundations of belief . . . yet
+in old days there had been monsters on the earth, and certainly some
+people had believed in just such mysterious changes of identity.  It was
+all very strange.  Just fancy how any stranger--say a doctor--would
+regard her, if she were to tell him that she had been to a tea-party with
+an antediluvian monster, and that they had been waited on by up-to-date
+men-servants.
+
+Adam had returned, exhilarated by his walk, and more settled in his mind
+than he had been for some time.  Like Mimi, he had gone through the phase
+of doubt and inability to believe in the reality of things, though it had
+not affected him to the same extent.  The idea, however, that his wife
+was suffering ill-effects from her terrible ordeal, braced him up.  He
+remained with her for a time, then he sought Sir Nathaniel in order to
+talk over the matter with him.  He knew that the calm common sense and
+self-reliance of the old man, as well as his experience, would be helpful
+to them all.
+
+Sir Nathaniel had come to the conclusion that, for some reason which he
+did not understand, Lady Arabella had changed her plans, and, for the
+present at all events, was pacific.  He was inclined to attribute her
+changed demeanour to the fact that her influence over Edgar Caswall was
+so far increased, as to justify a more fixed belief in his submission to
+her charms.
+
+As a matter of fact, she had seen Caswall that morning when she visited
+Castra Regis, and they had had a long talk together, during which the
+possibility of their union had been discussed.  Caswall, without being
+enthusiastic on the subject, had been courteous and attentive; as she had
+walked back to Diana's Grove, she almost congratulated herself on her new
+settlement in life.  That the idea was becoming fixed in her mind, was
+shown by a letter which she wrote later in the day to Adam Salton, and
+sent to him by hand.  It ran as follows:
+
+   "DEAR MR. SALTON,
+
+   "I wonder if you would kindly advise, and, if possible, help me in a
+   matter of business.  I have been for some time trying to make up my
+   mind to sell Diana's Grove, I have put off and put off the doing of it
+   till now.  The place is my own property, and no one has to be
+   consulted with regard to what I may wish to do about it.  It was
+   bought by my late husband, Captain Adolphus Ranger March, who had
+   another residence, The Crest, Appleby.  He acquired all rights of all
+   kinds, including mining and sporting.  When he died, he left his whole
+   property to me.  I shall feel leaving this place, which has become
+   endeared to me by many sacred memories and affections--the
+   recollection of many happy days of my young married life, and the more
+   than happy memories of the man I loved and who loved me so much.  I
+   should be willing to sell the place for any fair price--so long, of
+   course, as the purchaser was one I liked and of whom I approved.  May
+   I say that you yourself would be the ideal person.  But I dare not
+   hope for so much.  It strikes me, however, that among your Australian
+   friends may be someone who wishes to make a settlement in the Old
+   Country, and would care to fix the spot in one of the most historic
+   regions in England, full of romance and legend, and with a
+   never-ending vista of historical interest--an estate which, though
+   small, is in perfect condition and with illimitable possibilities of
+   development, and many doubtful--or unsettled--rights which have
+   existed before the time of the Romans or even Celts, who were the
+   original possessors.  In addition, the house has been kept up to the
+   _dernier cri_.  Immediate possession can be arranged.  My lawyers can
+   provide you, or whoever you may suggest, with all business and
+   historical details.  A word from you of acceptance or refusal is all
+   that is necessary, and we can leave details to be thrashed out by our
+   agents.  Forgive me, won't you, for troubling you in the matter, and
+   believe me, yours very sincerely.
+
+   "ARABELLA MARCH."
+
+Adam read this over several times, and then, his mind being made up, he
+went to Mimi and asked if she had any objection.  She answered--after a
+shudder--that she was, in this, as in all things, willing to do whatever
+he might wish.
+
+"Dearest, I am willing that you should judge what is best for us.  Be
+quite free to act as you see your duty, and as your inclination calls.  We
+are in the hands of God, and He has hitherto guided us, and will do so to
+His own end."
+
+From his wife's room Adam Salton went straight to the study in the tower,
+where he knew Sir Nathaniel would be at that hour.  The old man was
+alone, so, when he had entered in obedience to the "Come in," which
+answered his query, he closed the door and sat down beside him.
+
+"Do you think, sir, that it would be well for me to buy Diana's Grove?"
+
+"God bless my soul!" said the old man, startled, "why on earth would you
+want to do that?"
+
+"Well, I have vowed to destroy that White Worm, and my being able to do
+whatever I may choose with the Lair would facilitate matters and avoid
+complications."
+
+Sir Nathaniel hesitated longer than usual before speaking.  He was
+thinking deeply.
+
+"Yes, Adam, there is much common sense in your suggestion, though it
+startled me at first.  I think that, for all reasons, you would do well
+to buy the property and to have the conveyance settled at once.  If you
+want more money than is immediately convenient, let me know, so that I
+may be your banker."
+
+"Thank you, sir, most heartily; but I have more money at immediate call
+than I shall want.  I am glad you approve."
+
+"The property is historic, and as time goes on it will increase in value.
+Moreover, I may tell you something, which indeed is only a surmise, but
+which, if I am right, will add great value to the place."  Adam listened.
+"Has it ever struck you why the old name, 'The Lair of the White Worm,'
+was given?  We know that there was a snake which in early days was called
+a worm; but why white?"
+
+"I really don't know, sir; I never thought of it.  I simply took it for
+granted."
+
+"So did I at first--long ago.  But later I puzzled my brain for a
+reason."
+
+"And what was the reason, sir?"
+
+"Simply and solely because the snake or worm _was_ white.  We are near
+the county of Stafford, where the great industry of china-burning was
+originated and grew.  Stafford owes much of its wealth to the large
+deposits of the rare china clay found in it from time to time.  These
+deposits become in time pretty well exhausted; but for centuries Stafford
+adventurers looked for the special clay, as Ohio and Pennsylvania farmers
+and explorers looked for oil.  Anyone owning real estate on which china
+clay can be discovered strikes a sort of gold mine."
+
+"Yes, and then--"  The young man looked puzzled.
+
+"The original 'Worm' so-called, from which the name of the place came,
+had to find a direct way down to the marshes and the mud-holes.  Now, the
+clay is easily penetrable, and the original hole probably pierced a bed
+of china clay.  When once the way was made it would become a sort of
+highway for the Worm.  But as much movement was necessary to ascend such
+a great height, some of the clay would become attached to its rough skin
+by attrition.  The downway must have been easy work, but the ascent was
+different, and when the monster came to view in the upper world, it would
+be fresh from contact with the white clay.  Hence the name, which has no
+cryptic significance, but only fact.  Now, if that surmise be true--and I
+do not see why not--there must be a deposit of valuable clay--possibly of
+immense depth."
+
+Adam's comment pleased the old gentleman.
+
+"I have it in my bones, sir, that you have struck--or rather reasoned
+out--a great truth."
+
+Sir Nathaniel went on cheerfully.  "When the world of commerce wakes up
+to the value of your find, it will be as well that your title to
+ownership has been perfectly secured.  If anyone ever deserved such a
+gain, it is you."
+
+With his friend's aid, Adam secured the property without loss of time.
+Then he went to see his uncle, and told him about it.  Mr. Salton was
+delighted to find his young relative already constructively the owner of
+so fine an estate--one which gave him an important status in the county.
+He made many anxious enquiries about Mimi, and the doings of the White
+Worm, but Adam reassured him.
+
+The next morning, when Adam went to his host in the smoking-room, Sir
+Nathaniel asked him how he purposed to proceed with regard to keeping his
+vow.
+
+"It is a difficult matter which you have undertaken.  To destroy such a
+monster is something like one of the labours of Hercules, in that not
+only its size and weight and power of using them in little-known ways are
+against you, but the occult side is alone an unsurpassable difficulty.
+The Worm is already master of all the elements except fire--and I do not
+see how fire can be used for the attack.  It has only to sink into the
+earth in its usual way, and you could not overtake it if you had the
+resources of the biggest coal-mine in existence.  But I daresay you have
+mapped out some plan in your mind," he added courteously.
+
+"I have, sir.  But, of course, it may not stand the test of practice."
+
+"May I know the idea?"
+
+"Well, sir, this was my argument: At the time of the Chartist trouble, an
+idea spread amongst financial circles that an attack was going to be made
+on the Bank of England.  Accordingly, the directors of that institution
+consulted many persons who were supposed to know what steps should be
+taken, and it was finally decided that the best protection against
+fire--which is what was feared--was not water but sand.  To carry the
+scheme into practice great store of fine sea-sand--the kind that blows
+about and is used to fill hour-glasses--was provided throughout the
+building, especially at the points liable to attack, from which it could
+be brought into use.
+
+"I propose to provide at Diana's Grove, as soon as it comes into my
+possession, an enormous amount of such sand, and shall take an early
+occasion of pouring it into the well-hole, which it will in time choke.
+Thus Lady Arabella, in her guise of the White Worm, will find herself cut
+off from her refuge.  The hole is a narrow one, and is some hundreds of
+feet deep.  The weight of the sand this can contain would not in itself
+be sufficient to obstruct; but the friction of such a body working up
+against it would be tremendous."
+
+"One moment.  What use would the sand be for destruction?"
+
+"None, directly; but it would hold the struggling body in place till the
+rest of my scheme came into practice."
+
+"And what is the rest?"
+
+"As the sand is being poured into the well-hole, quantities of dynamite
+can also be thrown in!"
+
+"Good.  But how would the dynamite explode--for, of course, that is what
+you intend.  Would not some sort of wire or fuse he required for each
+parcel of dynamite?"
+
+Adam smiled.
+
+"Not in these days, sir.  That was proved in New York.  A thousand pounds
+of dynamite, in sealed canisters, was placed about some workings.  At the
+last a charge of gunpowder was fired, and the concussion exploded the
+dynamite.  It was most successful.  Those who were non-experts in high
+explosives expected that every pane of glass in New York would be
+shattered.  But, in reality, the explosive did no harm outside the area
+intended, although sixteen acres of rock had been mined and only the
+supporting walls and pillars had been left intact.  The whole of the
+rocks were shattered."
+
+Sir Nathaniel nodded approval.
+
+"That seems a good plan--a very excellent one.  But if it has to tear
+down so many feet of precipice, it may wreck the whole neighbourhood."
+
+"And free it for ever from a monster," added Adam, as he left the room to
+find his wife.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV--THE LAST BATTLE
+
+
+Lady Arabella had instructed her solicitors to hurry on with the
+conveyance of Diana's Grove, so no time was lost in letting Adam Salton
+have formal possession of the estate.  After his interview with Sir
+Nathaniel, he had taken steps to begin putting his plan into action.  In
+order to accumulate the necessary amount of fine sea-sand, he ordered the
+steward to prepare for an elaborate system of top-dressing all the
+grounds.  A great heap of the sand, brought from bays on the Welsh coast,
+began to grow at the back of the Grove.  No one seemed to suspect that it
+was there for any purpose other than what had been given out.
+
+Lady Arabella, who alone could have guessed, was now so absorbed in her
+matrimonial pursuit of Edgar Caswall, that she had neither time nor
+inclination for thought extraneous to this.  She had not yet moved from
+the house, though she had formally handed over the estate.
+
+Adam put up a rough corrugated-iron shed behind the Grove, in which he
+stored his explosives.  All being ready for his great attempt whenever
+the time should come, he was now content to wait, and, in order to pass
+the time, interested himself in other things--even in Caswall's great
+kite, which still flew from the high tower of Castra Regis.
+
+The mound of fine sand grew to proportions so vast as to puzzle the
+bailiffs and farmers round the Brow.  The hour of the intended cataclysm
+was approaching apace.  Adam wished--but in vain--for an opportunity,
+which would appear to be natural, of visiting Caswall in the turret of
+Castra Regis.  At last, one morning, he met Lady Arabella moving towards
+the Castle, so he took his courage _a deux mains_ and asked to be allowed
+to accompany her.  She was glad, for her own purposes, to comply with his
+wishes.  So together they entered, and found their way to the
+turret-room.  Caswall was much surprised to see Adam come to his house,
+but lent himself to the task of seeming to be pleased.  He played the
+host so well as to deceive even Adam.  They all went out on the turret
+roof, where he explained to his guests the mechanism for raising and
+lowering the kite, taking also the opportunity of testing the movements
+of the multitudes of birds, how they answered almost instantaneously to
+the lowering or raising of the kite.
+
+As Lady Arabella walked home with Adam from Castra Regis, she asked him
+if she might make a request.  Permission having been accorded, she
+explained that before she finally left Diana's Grove, where she had lived
+so long, she had a desire to know the depth of the well-hole.  Adam was
+really happy to meet her wishes, not from any sentiment, but because he
+wished to give some valid and ostensible reason for examining the passage
+of the Worm, which would obviate any suspicion resulting from his being
+on the premises.  He brought from London a Kelvin sounding apparatus,
+with a sufficient length of piano-wire for testing any probable depth.
+The wire passed easily over the running wheel, and when this was once
+fixed over the hole, he was satisfied to wait till the most advantageous
+time for his final experiment.
+
+* * * * *
+
+In the meantime, affairs had been going quietly at Mercy Farm.  Lilla, of
+course, felt lonely in the absence of her cousin, but the even tenor of
+life went on for her as for others.  After the first shock of parting was
+over, things went back to their accustomed routine.  In one respect,
+however, there was a marked difference.  So long as home conditions had
+remained unchanged, Lilla was content to put ambition far from her, and
+to settle down to the life which had been hers as long as she could
+remember.  But Mimi's marriage set her thinking; naturally, she came to
+the conclusion that she too might have a mate.  There was not for her
+much choice--there was little movement in the matrimonial direction at
+the farmhouse.  She did not approve of the personality of Edgar Caswall,
+and his struggle with Mimi had frightened her; but he was unmistakably an
+excellent _parti_, much better than she could have any right to expect.
+This weighs much with a woman, and more particularly one of her class.
+So, on the whole, she was content to let things take their course, and to
+abide by the issue.
+
+As time went on, she had reason to believe that things did not point to
+happiness.  She could not shut her eyes to certain disturbing facts,
+amongst which were the existence of Lady Arabella and her growing
+intimacy with Edgar Caswall; as well as his own cold and haughty nature,
+so little in accord with the ardour which is the foundation of a young
+maid's dreams of happiness.  How things would, of necessity, alter if she
+were to marry, she was afraid to think.  All told, the prospect was not
+happy for her, and she had a secret longing that something might occur to
+upset the order of things as at present arranged.
+
+When Lilla received a note from Edgar Caswall asking if he might come to
+tea on the following afternoon, her heart sank within her.  If it was
+only for her father's sake, she must not refuse him or show any
+disinclination which he might construe into incivility.  She missed Mimi
+more than she could say or even dared to think.  Hitherto, she had always
+looked to her cousin for sympathy, for understanding, for loyal support.
+Now she and all these things, and a thousand others--gentle, assuring,
+supporting--were gone.  And instead there was a horrible aching void.
+
+For the whole afternoon and evening, and for the following forenoon, poor
+Lilla's loneliness grew to be a positive agony.  For the first time she
+began to realise the sense of her loss, as though all the previous
+suffering had been merely a preparation.  Everything she looked at,
+everything she remembered or thought of, became laden with poignant
+memory.  Then on the top of all was a new sense of dread.  The reaction
+from the sense of security, which had surrounded her all her life, to a
+never-quieted apprehension, was at times almost more than she could bear.
+It so filled her with fear that she had a haunting feeling that she would
+as soon die as live.  However, whatever might be her own feelings, duty
+had to be done, and as she had been brought up to consider duty first,
+she braced herself to go through, to the very best of her ability, what
+was before her.
+
+Still, the severe and prolonged struggle for self-control told upon
+Lilla.  She looked, as she felt, ill and weak.  She was really in a
+nerveless and prostrate condition, with black circles round her eyes,
+pale even to her lips, and with an instinctive trembling which she was
+quite unable to repress.  It was for her a sad mischance that Mimi was
+away, for her love would have seen through all obscuring causes, and have
+brought to light the girl's unhappy condition of health.  Lilla was
+utterly unable to do anything to escape from the ordeal before her; but
+her cousin, with the experience of her former struggles with Mr. Caswall
+and of the condition in which these left her, would have taken steps--even
+peremptory ones, if necessary--to prevent a repetition.
+
+Edgar arrived punctually to the time appointed by herself.  When Lilla,
+through the great window, saw him approaching the house, her condition of
+nervous upset was pitiable.  She braced herself up, however, and managed
+to get through the interview in its preliminary stages without any
+perceptible change in her normal appearance and bearing.  It had been to
+her an added terror that the black shadow of Oolanga, whom she dreaded,
+would follow hard on his master.  A load was lifted from her mind when he
+did not make his usual stealthy approach.  She had also feared, though in
+lesser degree, lest Lady Arabella should be present to make trouble for
+her as before.
+
+With a woman's natural forethought in a difficult position, she had
+provided the furnishing of the tea-table as a subtle indication of the
+social difference between her and her guest.  She had chosen the
+implements of service, as well as all the provender set forth, of the
+humblest kind.  Instead of arranging the silver teapot and china cups,
+she had set out an earthen teapot, such as was in common use in the farm
+kitchen.  The same idea was carried out in the cups and saucers of thick
+homely delft, and in the cream-jug of similar kind.  The bread was of
+simple whole-meal, home-baked.  The butter was good, since she had made
+it herself, while the preserves and honey came from her own garden.  Her
+face beamed with satisfaction when the guest eyed the appointments with a
+supercilious glance.  It was a shock to the poor girl herself, for she
+enjoyed offering to a guest the little hospitalities possible to her; but
+that had to be sacrificed with other pleasures.
+
+Caswall's face was more set and iron-clad than ever--his piercing eyes
+seemed from the very beginning to look her through and through.  Her
+heart quailed when she thought of what would follow--of what would be the
+end, when this was only the beginning.  As some protection, though it
+could be only of a sentimental kind, she brought from her own room the
+photographs of Mimi, of her grandfather, and of Adam Salton, whom by now
+she had grown to look on with reliance, as a brother whom she could
+trust.  She kept the pictures near her heart, to which her hand naturally
+strayed when her feelings of constraint, distrust, or fear became so
+poignant as to interfere with the calm which she felt was necessary to
+help her through her ordeal.
+
+At first Edgar Caswall was courteous and polite, even thoughtful; but
+after a little while, when he found her resistance to his domination
+grow, he abandoned all forms of self-control and appeared in the same
+dominance as he had previously shown.  She was prepared, however, for
+this, both by her former experience and the natural fighting instinct
+within her.  By this means, as the minutes went on, both developed the
+power and preserved the equality in which they had begun.
+
+Without warning, the psychic battle between the two individualities began
+afresh.  This time both the positive and negative causes were all in
+favour of the man.  The woman was alone and in bad spirits, unsupported;
+nothing at all was in her favour except the memory of the two victorious
+contests; whereas the man, though unaided, as before, by either Lady
+Arabella or Oolanga, was in full strength, well rested, and in
+flourishing circumstances.  It was not, therefore, to be wondered at that
+his native dominance of character had full opportunity of asserting
+itself.  He began his preliminary stare with a conscious sense of power,
+and, as it appeared to have immediate effect on the girl, he felt an ever-
+growing conviction of ultimate victory.
+
+After a little Lilla's resolution began to flag.  She felt that the
+contest was unequal--that she was unable to put forth her best efforts.
+As she was an unselfish person, she could not fight so well in her own
+battle as in that of someone whom she loved and to whom she was devoted.
+Edgar saw the relaxing of the muscles of face and brow, and the almost
+collapse of the heavy eyelids which seemed tumbling downward in sleep.
+Lilla made gallant efforts to brace her dwindling powers, but for a time
+unsuccessfully.  At length there came an interruption, which seemed like
+a powerful stimulant.  Through the wide window she saw Lady Arabella
+enter the plain gateway of the farm, and advance towards the hall door.
+She was clad as usual in tight-fitting white, which accentuated her thin,
+sinuous figure.
+
+The sight did for Lilla what no voluntary effort could have done.  Her
+eyes flashed, and in an instant she felt as though a new life had
+suddenly developed within her.  Lady Arabella's entry, in her usual
+unconcerned, haughty, supercilious way, heightened the effect, so that
+when the two stood close to each other battle was joined.  Mr. Caswall,
+too, took new courage from her coming, and all his masterfulness and
+power came back to him.  His looks, intensified, had more obvious effect
+than had been noticeable that day.  Lilla seemed at last overcome by his
+dominance.  Her face became red and pale--violently red and ghastly
+pale--by rapid turns.  Her strength seemed gone.  Her knees collapsed,
+and she was actually sinking on the floor, when to her surprise and joy
+Mimi came into the room, running hurriedly and breathing heavily.
+
+Lilla rushed to her, and the two clasped hands.  With that, a new sense
+of power, greater than Lilla had ever seen in her, seemed to quicken her
+cousin.  Her hand swept the air in front of Edgar Caswall, seeming to
+drive him backward more and more by each movement, till at last he seemed
+to be actually hurled through the door which Mimi's entrance had left
+open, and fell at full length on the gravel path without.
+
+Then came the final and complete collapse of Lilla, who, without a sound,
+sank down on the floor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI--FACE TO FACE
+
+
+Mimi was greatly distressed when she saw her cousin lying prone.  She had
+a few times in her life seen Lilla on the verge of fainting, but never
+senseless; and now she was frightened.  She threw herself on her knees
+beside Lilla, and tried, by rubbing her hands and other measures commonly
+known, to restore her.  But all her efforts were unavailing.  Lilla still
+lay white and senseless.  In fact, each moment she looked worse; her
+breast, that had been heaving with the stress, became still, and the
+pallor of her face grew like marble.
+
+At these succeeding changes Mimi's fright grew, till it altogether
+mastered her.  She succeeded in controlling herself only to the extent
+that she did not scream.
+
+Lady Arabella had followed Caswall, when he had recovered sufficiently to
+get up and walk--though stumblingly--in the direction of Castra Regis.
+When Mimi was quite alone with Lilla and the need for effort had ceased,
+she felt weak and trembled.  In her own mind, she attributed it to a
+sudden change in the weather--it was momentarily becoming apparent that a
+storm was coming on.
+
+She raised Lilla's head and laid it on her warm young breast, but all in
+vain.  The cold of the white features thrilled through her, and she
+utterly collapsed when it was borne in on her that Lilla had passed away.
+
+The dusk gradually deepened and the shades of evening closed in, but Mimi
+did not seem to notice or to care.  She sat on the floor with her arms
+round the body of the girl whom she loved.  Darker and blacker grew the
+sky as the coming storm and the closing night joined forces.  Still she
+sat on--alone--tearless--unable to think.  Mimi did not know how long she
+sat there.  Though it seemed to her that ages had passed, it could not
+have been more than half-an-hour.  She suddenly came to herself, and was
+surprised to find that her grandfather had not returned.  For a while she
+lay quiet, thinking of the immediate past.  Lilla's hand was still in
+hers, and to her surprise it was still warm.  Somehow this helped her
+consciousness, and without any special act of will she stood up.  She lit
+a lamp and looked at her cousin.  There was no doubt that Lilla was dead;
+but when the lamp-light fell on her eyes, they seemed to look at Mimi
+with intent--with meaning.  In this state of dark isolation a new
+resolution came to her, and grew and grew until it became a fixed
+definite purpose.  She would face Caswall and call him to account for his
+murder of Lilla--that was what she called it to herself.  She would also
+take steps--she knew not what or how--to avenge the part taken by Lady
+Arabella.
+
+In this frame of mind she lit all the lamps in the room, got water and
+linen from her room, and set about the decent ordering of Lilla's body.
+This took some time; but when it was finished, she put on her hat and
+cloak, put out the lights, and set out quietly for Castra Regis.
+
+As Mimi drew near the Castle, she saw no lights except those in and
+around the tower room.  The lights showed her that Mr. Caswall was there,
+so she entered by the hall door, which as usual was open, and felt her
+way in the darkness up the staircase to the lobby of the room.  The door
+was ajar, and the light from within showed brilliantly through the
+opening.  She saw Edgar Caswall walking restlessly to and fro in the
+room, with his hands clasped behind his back.  She opened the door
+without knocking, and walked right into the room.  As she entered, he
+ceased walking, and stared at her in surprise.  She made no remark, no
+comment, but continued the fixed look which he had seen on her entrance.
+
+For a time silence reigned, and the two stood looking fixedly at each
+other.  Mimi was the first to speak.
+
+"You murderer!  Lilla is dead!"
+
+"Dead!  Good God!  When did she die?"
+
+"She died this afternoon, just after you left her."
+
+"Are you sure?"
+
+"Yes--and so are you--or you ought to be.  You killed her!"
+
+"I killed her!  Be careful what you say!"
+
+"As God sees us, it is true; and you know it.  You came to Mercy Farm on
+purpose to break her--if you could.  And the accomplice of your guilt,
+Lady Arabella March, came for the same purpose."
+
+"Be careful, woman," he said hotly.  "Do not use such names in that way,
+or you shall suffer for it."
+
+"I am suffering for it--have suffered for it--shall suffer for it.  Not
+for speaking the truth as I have done, but because you two, with devilish
+malignity, did my darling to death.  It is you and your accomplice who
+have to dread punishment, not I."
+
+"Take care!" he said again.
+
+"Oh, I am not afraid of you or your accomplice," she answered spiritedly.
+"I am content to stand by every word I have said, every act I have done.
+Moreover, I believe in God's justice.  I fear not the grinding of His
+mills; if necessary I shall set the wheels in motion myself.  But you
+don't care for God, or believe in Him.  Your god is your great kite,
+which cows the birds of a whole district.  But be sure that His hand,
+when it rises, always falls at the appointed time.  It may be that your
+name is being called even at this very moment at the Great Assize.  Repent
+while there is still time.  Happy you, if you may be allowed to enter
+those mighty halls in the company of the pure-souled angel whose voice
+has only to whisper one word of justice, and you disappear for ever into
+everlasting torment."
+
+The sudden death of Lilla caused consternation among Mimi's friends and
+well-wishers.  Such a tragedy was totally unexpected, as Adam and Sir
+Nathaniel had been expecting the White Worm's vengeance to fall upon
+themselves.
+
+Adam, leaving his wife free to follow her own desires with regard to
+Lilla and her grandfather, busied himself with filling the well-hole with
+the fine sand prepared for the purpose, taking care to have lowered at
+stated intervals quantities of the store of dynamite, so as to be ready
+for the final explosion.  He had under his immediate supervision a corps
+of workmen, and was assisted by Sir Nathaniel, who had come over for the
+purpose, and all were now staying at Lesser Hill.
+
+Mr. Salton, too, showed much interest in the job, and was constantly
+coming in and out, nothing escaping his observation.
+
+Since her marriage to Adam and their coming to stay at Doom Tower, Mimi
+had been fettered by fear of the horrible monster at Diana's Grove.  But
+now she dreaded it no longer.  She accepted the fact of its assuming at
+will the form of Lady Arabella.  She had still to tax and upbraid her for
+her part in the unhappiness which had been wrought on Lilla, and for her
+share in causing her death.
+
+One evening, when Mimi entered her own room, she went to the window and
+threw an eager look round the whole circle of sight.  A single glance
+satisfied her that the White Worm in _propria persona_ was not visible.
+So she sat down in the window-seat and enjoyed the pleasure of a full
+view, from which she had been so long cut off.  The maid who waited on
+her had told her that Mr. Salton had not yet returned home, so she felt
+free to enjoy the luxury of peace and quiet.
+
+As she looked out of the window, she saw something thin and white move
+along the avenue.  She thought she recognised the figure of Lady
+Arabella, and instinctively drew back behind the curtain.  When she had
+ascertained, by peeping out several times, that the lady had not seen
+her, she watched more carefully, all her instinctive hatred flooding back
+at the sight of her.  Lady Arabella was moving swiftly and stealthily,
+looking back and around her at intervals, as if she feared to be
+followed.  This gave Mimi an idea that she was up to no good, so she
+determined to seize the occasion for watching her in more detail.
+
+Hastily putting on a dark cloak and hat, she ran downstairs and out into
+the avenue.  Lady Arabella had moved, but the sheen of her white dress
+was still to be seen among the young oaks around the gateway.  Keeping in
+shadow, Mimi followed, taking care not to come so close as to awake the
+other's suspicion, and watched her quarry pass along the road in the
+direction of Castra Regis.
+
+She followed on steadily through the gloom of the trees, depending on the
+glint of the white dress to keep her right.  The wood began to thicken,
+and presently, when the road widened and the trees grew farther back, she
+lost sight of any indication of her whereabouts.  Under the present
+conditions it was impossible for her to do any more, so, after waiting
+for a while, still hidden in the shadow to see if she could catch another
+glimpse of the white frock, she determined to go on slowly towards Castra
+Regis, and trust to the chapter of accidents to pick up the trail again.
+She went on slowly, taking advantage of every obstacle and shadow to keep
+herself concealed.
+
+At last she entered on the grounds of the Castle, at a spot from which
+the windows of the turret were dimly visible, without having seen again
+any sign of Lady Arabella.
+
+Meanwhile, during most of the time that Mimi Salton had been moving
+warily along in the gloom, she was in reality being followed by Lady
+Arabella, who had caught sight of her leaving the house and had never
+again lost touch with her.  It was a case of the hunter being hunted.  For
+a time Mimi's many turnings, with the natural obstacles that were
+perpetually intervening, caused Lady Arabella some trouble; but when she
+was close to Castra Regis, there was no more possibility of concealment,
+and the strange double following went swiftly on.
+
+When she saw Mimi close to the hall door of Castra Regis and ascending
+the steps, she followed.  When Mimi entered the dark hall and felt her
+way up the staircase, still, as she believed, following Lady Arabella,
+the latter kept on her way.  When they reached the lobby of the turret-
+rooms, Mimi believed that the object of her search was ahead of her.
+
+Edgar Caswall sat in the gloom of the great room, occasionally stirred to
+curiosity when the drifting clouds allowed a little light to fall from
+the storm-swept sky.  But nothing really interested him now.  Since he
+had heard of Lilla's death, the gloom of his remorse, emphasised by
+Mimi's upbraiding, had made more hopeless his cruel, selfish, saturnine
+nature.  He heard no sound, for his normal faculties seemed benumbed.
+
+Mimi, when she came to the door, which stood ajar, gave a light tap.  So
+light was it that it did not reach Caswall's ears.  Then, taking her
+courage in both hands, she boldly pushed the door and entered.  As she
+did so, her heart sank, for now she was face to face with a difficulty
+which had not, in her state of mental perturbation, occurred to her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII--ON THE TURRET ROOF
+
+
+The storm which was coming was already making itself manifest, not only
+in the wide scope of nature, but in the hearts and natures of human
+beings.  Electrical disturbance in the sky and the air is reproduced in
+animals of all kinds, and particularly in the highest type of them
+all--the most receptive--the most electrical.  So it was with Edgar
+Caswall, despite his selfish nature and coldness of blood.  So it was
+with Mimi Salton, despite her unselfish, unchanging devotion for those
+she loved.  So it was even with Lady Arabella, who, under the instincts
+of a primeval serpent, carried the ever-varying wishes and customs of
+womanhood, which is always old--and always new.
+
+Edgar, after he had turned his eyes on Mimi, resumed his apathetic
+position and sullen silence.  Mimi quietly took a seat a little way
+apart, whence she could look on the progress of the coming storm and
+study its appearance throughout the whole visible circle of the
+neighbourhood.  She was in brighter and better spirits than she had been
+for many days past.  Lady Arabella tried to efface herself behind the now
+open door.
+
+Without, the clouds grew thicker and blacker as the storm-centre came
+closer.  As yet the forces, from whose linking the lightning springs,
+were held apart, and the silence of nature proclaimed the calm before the
+storm.  Caswall felt the effect of the gathering electric force.  A sort
+of wild exultation grew upon him, such as he had sometimes felt just
+before the breaking of a tropical storm.  As he became conscious of this,
+he raised his head and caught sight of Mimi.  He was in the grip of an
+emotion greater than himself; in the mood in which he was he felt the
+need upon him of doing some desperate deed.  He was now absolutely
+reckless, and as Mimi was associated with him in the memory which drove
+him on, he wished that she too should be engaged in this enterprise.  He
+had no knowledge of the proximity of Lady Arabella, and thought that he
+was far removed from all he knew and whose interests he shared--alone
+with the wild elements, which were being lashed to fury, and with the
+woman who had struggled with him and vanquished him, and on whom he would
+shower the full measure of his hate.
+
+The fact was that Edgar Caswall was, if not mad, close to the
+border-line.  Madness in its first stage--monomania--is a lack of
+proportion.  So long as this is general, it is not always noticeable, for
+the uninspired onlooker is without the necessary means of comparison.  But
+in monomania the errant faculty protrudes itself in a way that may not be
+denied.  It puts aside, obscures, or takes the place of something
+else--just as the head of a pin placed before the centre of the iris will
+block out the whole scope of vision.  The most usual form of monomania
+has commonly the same beginning as that from which Edgar Caswall
+suffered--an over-large idea of self-importance.  Alienists, who study
+the matter exactly, probably know more of human vanity and its effects
+than do ordinary men.  Caswall's mental disturbance was not hard to
+identify.  Every asylum is full of such cases--men and women, who,
+naturally selfish and egotistical, so appraise to themselves their own
+importance that every other circumstance in life becomes subservient to
+it.  The disease supplies in itself the material for self-magnification.
+When the decadence attacks a nature naturally proud and selfish and vain,
+and lacking both the aptitude and habit of self-restraint, the
+development of the disease is more swift, and ranges to farther limits.
+It is such persons who become imbued with the idea that they have the
+attributes of the Almighty--even that they themselves are the Almighty.
+
+Mimi had a suspicion--or rather, perhaps, an intuition--of the true state
+of things when she heard him speak, and at the same time noticed the
+abnormal flush on his face, and his rolling eyes.  There was a certain
+want of fixedness of purpose which she had certainly not noticed before--a
+quick, spasmodic utterance which belongs rather to the insane than to
+those of intellectual equilibrium.  She was a little frightened, not only
+by his thoughts, but by his staccato way of expressing them.
+
+Caswall moved to the door leading to the turret stair by which the roof
+was reached, and spoke in a peremptory way, whose tone alone made her
+feel defiant.
+
+"Come!  I want you."
+
+She instinctively drew back--she was not accustomed to such words, more
+especially to such a tone.  Her answer was indicative of a new contest.
+
+"Why should I go?  What for?"
+
+He did not at once reply--another indication of his overwhelming egotism.
+She repeated her questions; habit reasserted itself, and he spoke without
+thinking the words which were in his heart.
+
+"I want you, if you will be so good, to come with me to the turret roof.
+I am much interested in certain experiments with the kite, which would
+be, if not a pleasure, at least a novel experience to you.  You would see
+something not easily seen otherwise."
+
+"I will come," she answered simply; Edgar moved in the direction of the
+stair, she following close behind him.
+
+She did not like to be left alone at such a height, in such a place, in
+the darkness, with a storm about to break.  Of himself she had no fear;
+all that had been seemed to have passed away with her two victories over
+him in the struggle of wills.  Moreover, the more recent
+apprehension--that of his madness--had also ceased.  In the conversation
+of the last few minutes he seemed so rational, so clear, so unaggressive,
+that she no longer saw reason for doubt.  So satisfied was she that even
+when he put out a hand to guide her to the steep, narrow stairway, she
+took it without thought in the most conventional way.
+
+Lady Arabella, crouching in the lobby behind the door, heard every word
+that had been said, and formed her own opinion of it.  It seemed evident
+to her that there had been some rapprochement between the two who had so
+lately been hostile to each other, and that made her furiously angry.
+Mimi was interfering with her plans!  She had made certain of her capture
+of Edgar Caswall, and she could not tolerate even the lightest and most
+contemptuous fancy on his part which might divert him from the main
+issue.  When she became aware that he wished Mimi to come with him to the
+roof and that she had acquiesced, her rage got beyond bounds.  She became
+oblivious to any danger there might be in a visit to such an exposed
+place at such a time, and to all lesser considerations, and made up her
+mind to forestall them.  She stealthily and noiselessly crept through the
+wicket, and, ascending the stair, stepped out on the roof.  It was
+bitterly cold, for the fierce gusts of the storm which swept round the
+turret drove in through every unimpeded way, whistling at the sharp
+corners and singing round the trembling flagstaff.  The kite-string and
+the wire which controlled the runners made a concourse of weird sounds
+which somehow, perhaps from the violence which surrounded them, acting on
+their length, resolved themselves into some kind of harmony--a fitting
+accompaniment to the tragedy which seemed about to begin.
+
+Mimi's heart beat heavily.  Just before leaving the turret-chamber she
+had a shock which she could not shake off.  The lights of the room had
+momentarily revealed to her, as they passed out, Edgar's face,
+concentrated as it was whenever he intended to use his mesmeric power.
+Now the black eyebrows made a thick line across his face, under which his
+eyes shone and glittered ominously.  Mimi recognised the danger, and
+assumed the defiant attitude that had twice already served her so well.
+She had a fear that the circumstances and the place were against her, and
+she wanted to be forearmed.
+
+The sky was now somewhat lighter than it had been.  Either there was
+lightning afar off, whose reflections were carried by the rolling clouds,
+or else the gathered force, though not yet breaking into lightning, had
+an incipient power of light.  It seemed to affect both the man and the
+woman.  Edgar seemed altogether under its influence.  His spirits were
+boisterous, his mind exalted.  He was now at his worst; madder than he
+had been earlier in the night.
+
+Mimi, trying to keep as far from him as possible, moved across the stone
+floor of the turret roof, and found a niche which concealed her.  It was
+not far from Lady Arabella's place of hiding.
+
+Edgar, left thus alone on the centre of the turret roof, found himself
+altogether his own master in a way which tended to increase his madness.
+He knew that Mimi was close at hand, though he had lost sight of her.  He
+spoke loudly, and the sound of his own voice, though it was carried from
+him on the sweeping wind as fast as the words were spoken, seemed to
+exalt him still more.  Even the raging of the elements round him appeared
+to add to his exaltation.  To him it seemed that these manifestations
+were obedient to his own will.  He had reached the sublime of his
+madness; he was now in his own mind actually the Almighty, and whatever
+might happen would be the direct carrying out of his own commands.  As he
+could not see Mimi, nor fix whereabout she was, he shouted loudly:
+
+"Come to me!  You shall see now what you are despising, what you are
+warring against.  All that you see is mine--the darkness as well as the
+light.  I tell you that I am greater than any other who is, or was, or
+shall be.  When the Master of Evil took Christ up on a high place and
+showed Him all the kingdoms of the earth, he was doing what he thought no
+other could do.  He was wrong--he forgot _Me_.  I shall send you light,
+up to the very ramparts of heaven.  A light so great that it shall
+dissipate those black clouds that are rushing up and piling around us.
+Look!  Look!  At the very touch of my hand that light springs into being
+and mounts up--and up--and up!"
+
+He made his way whilst he was speaking to the corner of the turret whence
+flew the giant kite, and from which the runners ascended.  Mimi looked
+on, appalled and afraid to speak lest she should precipitate some
+calamity.  Within the niche Lady Arabella cowered in a paroxysm of fear.
+
+Edgar took up a small wooden box, through a hole in which the wire of the
+runner ran.  This evidently set some machinery in motion, for a sound as
+of whirring came.  From one side of the box floated what looked like a
+piece of stiff ribbon, which snapped and crackled as the wind took it.
+For a few seconds Mimi saw it as it rushed along the sagging line to the
+kite.  When close to it, there was a loud crack, and a sudden light
+appeared to issue from every chink in the box.  Then a quick flame
+flashed along the snapping ribbon, which glowed with an intense light--a
+light so great that the whole of the countryside around stood out against
+the background of black driving clouds.  For a few seconds the light
+remained, then suddenly disappeared in the blackness around.  It was
+simply a magnesium light, which had been fired by the mechanism within
+the box and carried up to the kite.  Edgar was in a state of tumultuous
+excitement, shouting and yelling at the top of his voice and dancing
+about like a lunatic.
+
+This was more than Lady Arabella's curious dual nature could stand--the
+ghoulish element in her rose triumphant, and she abandoned all idea of
+marriage with Edgar Caswall, gloating fiendishly over the thought of
+revenge.
+
+She must lure him to the White Worm's hole--but how?  She glanced around
+and quickly made up her mind.  The man's whole thoughts were absorbed by
+his wonderful kite, which he was showing off, in order to fascinate her
+imaginary rival, Mimi.
+
+On the instant she glided through the darkness to the wheel whereon the
+string of the kite was wound.  With deft fingers she unshipped this, took
+it with her, reeling out the wire as she went, thus keeping, in a way, in
+touch with the kite.  Then she glided swiftly to the wicket, through
+which she passed, locking the gate behind her as she went.
+
+Down the turret stair she ran quickly, letting the wire run from the
+wheel which she carried carefully, and, passing out of the hall door,
+hurried down the avenue with all her speed.  She soon reached her own
+gate, ran down the avenue, and with her key opened the iron door leading
+to the well-hole.
+
+She felt well satisfied with herself.  All her plans were maturing, or
+had already matured.  The Master of Castra Regis was within her grasp.
+The woman whose interference she had feared, Lilla Watford, was dead.
+Truly, all was well, and she felt that she might pause a while and rest.
+She tore off her clothes, with feverish fingers, and in full enjoyment of
+her natural freedom, stretched her slim figure in animal delight.  Then
+she lay down on the sofa--to await her victim!  Edgar Caswall's life
+blood would more than satisfy her for some time to come.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII--THE BREAKING OF THE STORM
+
+
+When Lady Arabella had crept away in her usual noiseless fashion, the two
+others remained for a while in their places on the turret roof: Caswall
+because he had nothing to say, Mimi because she had much to say and
+wished to put her thoughts in order.  For quite a while--which seemed
+interminable--silence reigned between them.  At last Mimi made a
+beginning--she had made up her mind how to act.
+
+"Mr. Caswall," she said loudly, so as to make sure of being heard through
+the blustering of the wind and the perpetual cracking of the electricity.
+
+Caswall said something in reply, but his words were carried away on the
+storm.  However, one of her objects was effected: she knew now exactly
+whereabout on the roof he was.  So she moved close to the spot before she
+spoke again, raising her voice almost to a shout.
+
+"The wicket is shut.  Please to open it.  I can't get out."
+
+As she spoke, she was quietly fingering a revolver which Adam had given
+to her in case of emergency and which now lay in her breast.  She felt
+that she was caged like a rat in a trap, but did not mean to be taken at
+a disadvantage, whatever happened.  Caswall also felt trapped, and all
+the brute in him rose to the emergency.  In a voice which was raucous and
+brutal--much like that which is heard when a wife is being beaten by her
+husband in a slum--he hissed out, his syllables cutting through the
+roaring of the storm:
+
+"You came of your own accord--without permission, or even asking it.  Now
+you can stay or go as you choose.  But you must manage it for yourself;
+I'll have nothing to do with it."
+
+Her answer was spoken with dangerous suavity
+
+"I am going.  Blame yourself if you do not like the time and manner of
+it.  I daresay Adam--my husband--will have a word to say to you about
+it!"
+
+"Let him say, and be damned to him, and to you too!  I'll show you a
+light.  You shan't be able to say that you could not see what you were
+doing."
+
+As he spoke, he was lighting another piece of the magnesium ribbon, which
+made a blinding glare in which everything was plainly discernible, down
+to the smallest detail.  This exactly suited Mimi.  She took accurate
+note of the wicket and its fastening before the glare had died away.  She
+took her revolver out and fired into the lock, which was shivered on the
+instant, the pieces flying round in all directions, but happily without
+causing hurt to anyone.  Then she pushed the wicket open and ran down the
+narrow stair, and so to the hall door.  Opening this also, she ran down
+the avenue, never lessening her speed till she stood outside the door of
+Lesser Hill.  The door was opened at once on her ringing.
+
+"Is Mr. Adam Salton in?" she asked.
+
+"He has just come in, a few minutes ago.  He has gone up to the study,"
+replied a servant.
+
+She ran upstairs at once and joined him.  He seemed relieved when he saw
+her, but scrutinised her face keenly.  He saw that she had been in some
+concern, so led her over to the sofa in the window and sat down beside
+her.
+
+"Now, dear, tell me all about it!" he said.
+
+She rushed breathlessly through all the details of her adventure on the
+turret roof.  Adam listened attentively, helping her all he could, and
+not embarrassing her by any questioning.  His thoughtful silence was a
+great help to her, for it allowed her to collect and organise her
+thoughts.
+
+"I must go and see Caswall to-morrow, to hear what he has to say on the
+subject."
+
+"But, dear, for my sake, don't have any quarrel with Mr. Caswall.  I have
+had too much trial and pain lately to wish it increased by any anxiety
+regarding you."
+
+"You shall not, dear--if I can help it--please God," he said solemnly,
+and he kissed her.
+
+Then, in order to keep her interested so that she might forget the fears
+and anxieties that had disturbed her, he began to talk over the details
+of her adventure, making shrewd comments which attracted and held her
+attention.  Presently, _inter alia_, he said:
+
+"That's a dangerous game Caswall is up to.  It seems to me that that
+young man--though he doesn't appear to know it--is riding for a fall!"
+
+"How, dear?  I don't understand."
+
+"Kite flying on a night like this from a place like the tower of Castra
+Regis is, to say the least of it, dangerous.  It is not merely courting
+death or other accident from lightning, but it is bringing the lightning
+into where he lives.  Every cloud that is blowing up here--and they all
+make for the highest point--is bound to develop into a flash of
+lightning.  That kite is up in the air and is bound to attract the
+lightning.  Its cord makes a road for it on which to travel to earth.
+When it does come, it will strike the top of the tower with a weight a
+hundred times greater than a whole park of artillery, and will knock
+Castra Regis into pieces.  Where it will go after that, no one can tell.
+If there should be any metal by which it can travel, such will not only
+point the road, but be the road itself."
+
+"Would it be dangerous to be out in the open air when such a thing is
+taking place?" she asked.
+
+"No, little woman.  It would be the safest possible place--so long as one
+was not in the line of the electric current."
+
+"Then, do let us go outside.  I don't want to run into any foolish
+danger--or, far more, to ask you to do so.  But surely if the open is
+safest, that is the place for us."
+
+Without another word, she put on again the cloak she had thrown off, and
+a small, tight-fitting cap.  Adam too put on his cap, and, after seeing
+that his revolver was all right, gave her his hand, and they left the
+house together.
+
+"I think the best thing we can do will be to go round all the places
+which are mixed up in this affair."
+
+"All right, dear, I am ready.  But, if you don't mind, we might go first
+to Mercy.  I am anxious about grandfather, and we might see that--as yet,
+at all events--nothing has happened there."
+
+So they went on the high-hung road along the top of the Brow.  The wind
+here was of great force, and made a strange booming noise as it swept
+high overhead; though not the sound of cracking and tearing as it passed
+through the woods of high slender trees which grew on either side of the
+road.  Mimi could hardly keep her feet.  She was not afraid; but the
+force to which she was opposed gave her a good excuse to hold on to her
+husband extra tight.
+
+At Mercy there was no one up--at least, all the lights were out.  But to
+Mimi, accustomed to the nightly routine of the house, there were manifest
+signs that all was well, except in the little room on the first floor,
+where the blinds were down.  Mimi could not bear to look at that, to
+think of it.  Adam understood her pain, for he had been keenly interested
+in poor Lilla.  He bent over and kissed her, and then took her hand and
+held it hard.  Thus they passed on together, returning to the high road
+towards Castra Regis.
+
+At the gate of Castra Regis they were extra careful.  When drawing near,
+Adam stumbled upon the wire that Lady Arabella had left trailing on the
+ground.
+
+Adam drew his breath at this, and spoke in a low, earnest whisper:
+
+"I don't want to frighten you, Mimi dear, but wherever that wire is there
+is danger."
+
+"Danger!  How?"
+
+"That is the track where the lightning will go; at any moment, even now
+whilst we are speaking and searching, a fearful force may be loosed upon
+us.  Run on, dear; you know the way to where the avenue joins the
+highroad.  If you see any sign of the wire, keep away from it, for God's
+sake.  I shall join you at the gateway."
+
+"Are you going to follow that wire alone?"
+
+"Yes, dear.  One is sufficient for that work.  I shall not lose a moment
+till I am with you."
+
+"Adam, when I came with you into the open, my main wish was that we
+should be together if anything serious happened.  You wouldn't deny me
+that right, would you, dear?"
+
+"No, dear, not that or any right.  Thank God that my wife has such a
+wish.  Come; we will go together.  We are in the hands of God.  If He
+wishes, we shall be together at the end, whenever or wherever that may
+be."
+
+They picked up the trail of the wire on the steps and followed it down
+the avenue, taking care not to touch it with their feet.  It was easy
+enough to follow, for the wire, if not bright, was self-coloured, and
+showed clearly.  They followed it out of the gateway and into the avenue
+of Diana's Grove.
+
+Here a new gravity clouded Adam's face, though Mimi saw no cause for
+fresh concern.  This was easily enough explained.  Adam knew of the
+explosive works in progress regarding the well-hole, but the matter had
+been kept from his wife.  As they stood near the house, Adam asked Mimi
+to return to the road, ostensibly to watch the course of the wire,
+telling her that there might be a branch wire leading somewhere else.  She
+was to search the undergrowth, and if she found it, was to warn him by
+the Australian native "Coo-ee!"
+
+Whilst they were standing together, there came a blinding flash of
+lightning, which lit up for several seconds the whole area of earth and
+sky.  It was only the first note of the celestial prelude, for it was
+followed in quick succession by numerous flashes, whilst the crash and
+roll of thunder seemed continuous.
+
+Adam, appalled, drew his wife to him and held her close.  As far as he
+could estimate by the interval between lightning and thunder-clap, the
+heart of the storm was still some distance off, so he felt no present
+concern for their safety.  Still, it was apparent that the course of the
+storm was moving swiftly in their direction.  The lightning flashes came
+faster and faster and closer together; the thunder-roll was almost
+continuous, not stopping for a moment--a new crash beginning before the
+old one had ceased.  Adam kept looking up in the direction where the kite
+strained and struggled at its detaining cord, but, of course, the dull
+evening light prevented any distinct scrutiny.
+
+At length there came a flash so appallingly bright that in its glare
+Nature seemed to be standing still.  So long did it last, that there was
+time to distinguish its configuration.  It seemed like a mighty tree
+inverted, pendent from the sky.  The whole country around within the
+angle of vision was lit up till it seemed to glow.  Then a broad ribbon
+of fire seemed to drop on to the tower of Castra Regis just as the
+thunder crashed.  By the glare, Adam could see the tower shake and
+tremble, and finally fall to pieces like a house of cards.  The passing
+of the lightning left the sky again dark, but a blue flame fell downward
+from the tower, and, with inconceivable rapidity, running along the
+ground in the direction of Diana's Grove, reached the dark silent house,
+which in the instant burst into flame at a hundred different points.
+
+At the same moment there rose from the house a rending, crashing sound of
+woodwork, broken or thrown about, mixed with a quick scream so appalling
+that Adam, stout of heart as he undoubtedly was, felt his blood turn into
+ice.  Instinctively, despite the danger and their consciousness of it,
+husband and wife took hands and listened, trembling.  Something was going
+on close to them, mysterious, terrible, deadly!  The shrieks continued,
+though less sharp in sound, as though muffled.  In the midst of them was
+a terrific explosion, seemingly from deep in the earth.
+
+The flames from Castra Regis and from Diana's Grove made all around
+almost as light as day, and now that the lightning had ceased to flash,
+their eyes, unblinded, were able to judge both perspective and detail.
+The heat of the burning house caused the iron doors to warp and collapse.
+Seemingly of their own accord, they fell open, and exposed the interior.
+The Saltons could now look through to the room beyond, where the well-
+hole yawned, a deep narrow circular chasm.  From this the agonised
+shrieks were rising, growing ever more terrible with each second that
+passed.
+
+But it was not only the heart-rending sound that almost paralysed poor
+Mimi with terror.  What she saw was sufficient to fill her with evil
+dreams for the remainder of her life.  The whole place looked as if a sea
+of blood had been beating against it.  Each of the explosions from below
+had thrown out from the well-hole, as if it had been the mouth of a
+cannon, a mass of fine sand mixed with blood, and a horrible repulsive
+slime in which were great red masses of rent and torn flesh and fat.  As
+the explosions kept on, more and more of this repulsive mass was shot up,
+the great bulk of it falling back again.  Many of the awful fragments
+were of something which had lately been alive.  They quivered and
+trembled and writhed as though they were still in torment, a supposition
+to which the unending scream gave a horrible credence.  At moments some
+mountainous mass of flesh surged up through the narrow orifice, as though
+forced by a measureless power through an opening infinitely smaller than
+itself.  Some of these fragments were partially covered with white skin
+as of a human being, and others--the largest and most numerous--with
+scaled skin as of a gigantic lizard or serpent.  Once, in a sort of lull
+or pause, the seething contents of the hole rose, after the manner of a
+bubbling spring, and Adam saw part of the thin form of Lady Arabella,
+forced up to the top amid a mass of blood and slime, and what looked as
+if it had been the entrails of a monster torn into shreds.  Several times
+some masses of enormous bulk were forced up through the well-hole with
+inconceivable violence, and, suddenly expanding as they came into larger
+space, disclosed sections of the White Worm which Adam and Sir Nathaniel
+had seen looking over the trees with its enormous eyes of emerald-green
+flickering like great lamps in a gale.
+
+At last the explosive power, which was not yet exhausted, evidently
+reached the main store of dynamite which had been lowered into the worm
+hole.  The result was appalling.  The ground for far around quivered and
+opened in long deep chasms, whose edges shook and fell in, throwing up
+clouds of sand which fell back and hissed amongst the rising water.  The
+heavily built house shook to its foundations.  Great stones were thrown
+up as from a volcano, some of them, great masses of hard stone, squared
+and grooved with implements wrought by human hands, breaking up and
+splitting in mid air as though riven by some infernal power.  Trees near
+the house--and therefore presumably in some way above the hole, which
+sent up clouds of dust and steam and fine sand mingled, and which carried
+an appalling stench which sickened the spectators--were torn up by the
+roots and hurled into the air.  By now, flames were bursting violently
+from all over the ruins, so dangerously that Adam caught up his wife in
+his arms, and ran with her from the proximity of the flames.
+
+Then almost as quickly as it had begun, the whole cataclysm ceased,
+though a deep-down rumbling continued intermittently for some time.  Then
+silence brooded over all--silence so complete that it seemed in itself a
+sentient thing--silence which seemed like incarnate darkness, and
+conveyed the same idea to all who came within its radius.  To the young
+people who had suffered the long horror of that awful night, it brought
+relief--relief from the presence or the fear of all that was
+horrible--relief which seemed perfected when the red rays of sunrise shot
+up over the far eastern sea, bringing a promise of a new order of things
+with the coming day.
+
+* * * * *
+
+His bed saw little of Adam Salton for the remainder of that night.  He
+and Mimi walked hand in hand in the brightening dawn round by the Brow to
+Castra Regis and on to Lesser Hill.  They did so deliberately, in an
+attempt to think as little as possible of the terrible experiences of the
+night.  The morning was bright and cheerful, as a morning sometimes is
+after a devastating storm.  The clouds, of which there were plenty in
+evidence, brought no lingering idea of gloom.  All nature was bright and
+joyous, being in striking contrast to the scenes of wreck and
+devastation, the effects of obliterating fire and lasting ruin.
+
+The only evidence of the once stately pile of Castra Regis and its
+inhabitants was a shapeless huddle of shattered architecture, dimly seen
+as the keen breeze swept aside the cloud of acrid smoke which marked the
+site of the once lordly castle.  As for Diana's Grove, they looked in
+vain for a sign which had a suggestion of permanence.  The oak trees of
+the Grove were still to be seen--some of them--emerging from a haze of
+smoke, the great trunks solid and erect as ever, but the larger branches
+broken and twisted and rent, with bark stripped and chipped, and the
+smaller branches broken and dishevelled looking from the constant stress
+and threshing of the storm.
+
+Of the house as such, there was, even at the short distance from which
+they looked, no trace.  Adam resolutely turned his back on the
+devastation and hurried on.  Mimi was not only upset and shocked in many
+ways, but she was physically "dog tired," and falling asleep on her feet.
+Adam took her to her room and made her undress and get into bed, taking
+care that the room was well lighted both by sunshine and lamps.  The only
+obstruction was from a silk curtain, drawn across the window to keep out
+the glare.  He sat beside her, holding her hand, well knowing that the
+comfort of his presence was the best restorative for her.  He stayed with
+her till sleep had overmastered her wearied body.  Then he went softly
+away.  He found his uncle and Sir Nathaniel in the study, having an early
+cup of tea, amplified to the dimensions of a possible breakfast.  Adam
+explained that he had not told his wife that he was going over the
+horrible places again, lest it should frighten her, for the rest and
+sleep in ignorance would help her and make a gap of peacefulness between
+the horrors.
+
+Sir Nathaniel agreed.
+
+"We know, my boy," he said, "that the unfortunate Lady Arabella is dead,
+and that the foul carcase of the Worm has been torn to pieces--pray God
+that its evil soul will never more escape from the nethermost hell."
+
+They visited Diana's Grove first, not only because it was nearer, but
+also because it was the place where most description was required, and
+Adam felt that he could tell his story best on the spot.  The absolute
+destruction of the place and everything in it seen in the broad daylight
+was almost inconceivable.  To Sir Nathaniel, it was as a story of horror
+full and complete.  But to Adam it was, as it were, only on the fringes.
+He knew what was still to be seen when his friends had got over the
+knowledge of externals.  As yet, they had only seen the outside of the
+house--or rather, where the outside of the house once had been.  The
+great horror lay within.  However, age--and the experience of age--counts.
+
+A strange, almost elemental, change in the aspect had taken place in the
+time which had elapsed since the dawn.  It would almost seem as if Nature
+herself had tried to obliterate the evil signs of what had occurred.
+True, the utter ruin of the house was made even more manifest in the
+searching daylight; but the more appalling destruction which lay beneath
+was not visible.  The rent, torn, and dislocated stonework looked worse
+than before; the upheaved foundations, the piled-up fragments of masonry,
+the fissures in the torn earth--all were at the worst.  The Worm's hole
+was still evident, a round fissure seemingly leading down into the very
+bowels of the earth.  But all the horrid mass of blood and slime, of
+torn, evil-smelling flesh and the sickening remnants of violent death,
+were gone.  Either some of the later explosions had thrown up from the
+deep quantities of water which, though foul and corrupt itself, had still
+some cleansing power left, or else the writhing mass which stirred from
+far below had helped to drag down and obliterate the items of horror.  A
+grey dust, partly of fine sand, partly of the waste of the falling ruin,
+covered everything, and, though ghastly itself, helped to mask something
+still worse.
+
+After a few minutes of watching, it became apparent to the three men that
+the turmoil far below had not yet ceased.  At short irregular intervals
+the hell-broth in the hole seemed as if boiling up.  It rose and fell
+again and turned over, showing in fresh form much of the nauseous detail
+which had been visible earlier.  The worst parts were the great masses of
+the flesh of the monstrous Worm, in all its red and sickening aspect.
+Such fragments had been bad enough before, but now they were infinitely
+worse.  Corruption comes with startling rapidity to beings whose
+destruction has been due wholly or in part to lightning--the whole mass
+seemed to have become all at once corrupt!  The whole surface of the
+fragments, once alive, was covered with insects, worms, and vermin of all
+kinds.  The sight was horrible enough, but, with the awful smell added,
+was simply unbearable.  The Worm's hole appeared to breathe forth death
+in its most repulsive forms.  The friends, with one impulse, moved to the
+top of the Brow, where a fresh breeze from the sea was blowing up.
+
+At the top of the Brow, beneath them as they looked down, they saw a
+shining mass of white, which looked strangely out of place amongst such
+wreckage as they had been viewing.  It appeared so strange that Adam
+suggested trying to find a way down, so that they might see it more
+closely.
+
+"We need not go down; I know what it is," Sir Nathaniel said.  "The
+explosions of last night have blown off the outside of the cliffs--that
+which we see is the vast bed of china clay through which the Worm
+originally found its way down to its lair.  I can catch the glint of the
+water of the deep quags far down below.  Well, her ladyship didn't
+deserve such a funeral--or such a monument."
+
+* * * * *
+
+The horrors of the last few hours had played such havoc with Mimi's
+nerves, that a change of scene was imperative--if a permanent breakdown
+was to be avoided.
+
+"I think," said old Mr. Salton, "it is quite time you young people
+departed for that honeymoon of yours!"  There was a twinkle in his eye as
+he spoke.
+
+Mimi's soft shy glance at her stalwart husband, was sufficient answer.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM***
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