Nevertheless, for some strange reason or other, it began to fascinate him. He stared at it fixedly, as a patient stares at a disc of metal given him by the trained hypnotist of a French hospital when a trance is to be induced.
Something within began to urge him to rise from his seat, cross the room, and see exactly what it was that lay there. The prompting grew stronger and stronger, until it filled his brain with an intensity of compulsion such as he had never known before.
He resented the extraordinary influence bitterly. A mad, unreasoning anger welled up within him.
"I will not go!" he said aloud. "Nothing in the world shall make me go!"
All that an ordinary spectator—had there been one in the waiting-room—would have seen was a pale-faced man staring at the table.
Yet, nevertheless, a wild battle was going on, almost frightful in its strength and power, though the end of it came simply enough.
The man could bear the fierce striving against this unknown and mysterious compulsion no longer. His will suddenly dissolved, melted away, fell to pieces like a child's house of cards, and with a deep sigh that was almost a groan he rose and moved unsteadily towards the table.
He looked down at the book.
At first there was a mist before his eyes; then it rolled up like a curtain and these words sprang out clear and vividly distinct from the printed page: "But the Lord was with Joseph, and showed him mercy."