The old housekeeper had indeed a long series of eccentricities to record to Salis, speaking freely to him, as to her master’s firmest friend, though what she knew and had diminished in intensity more than magnified was but a tithe of that which had occurred.
For it had been a terrible period for the young doctor. Half wrecked by the mental and bodily injuries he had received, the course he had pursued in shutting himself up alone, dreading to be surprised in suddenly uttering some wild speech or committing some vagary, had intensified the abnormal condition of his brain till his sufferings seemed to grow unbearable.
One hour he felt at peace, the next he had none, and asked himself what he was to do to escape the terrible unseen presence that was always with him, never addressing him, but, as it were, making his body the medium by which he communicated with the world.
“I can bear it no longer,” North said to himself at last. “There must be rest for me if I cannot shake it off.”
He shuddered slightly as he paced his darkened room, knowing instinctively how many steps to take in each direction, and what to avoid. For Death, familiar as it was to him, was not without its terrors.
He was so young, and, as it seemed now, the hopes of the past arose once more before him, the faith in the prizes of fame which he would win, his love for Leo, and the promises which had led him on.
But so sure as these thoughts assumed form there was another to rise like a dense cloud of horror and cover everything, as he felt that, come what might, he would be haunted ever by this unseen presence—the spirit which he had freed from its envelope of clay—and this could have but one end.
He felt that he had tried everything. He had forced himself to calmness, and marked out course after course of treatment such as he would have prescribed to some poor wretch who had consulted him in such a case; and when all was still at night he had stolen down to his surgery, and mingled for his own use sedatives and tonics, but all to no effect. If anything, his malady increased.
Two days before Salis had gone over to King’s Hampton, Cousin Thompson came once more to his bedroom door, to beg that he would come down and see his friend.
“It is impossible,” he had replied hoarsely.