About nine he returned to his lodging. He lit the lamp, drew the curtains across the window, and built up a good fire. He set himself to do three hours’ reading before he turned into bed. However, that power of will it was his wont to exert to its fullest capacity was for once insubordinate. There were not two consecutive sentences upon any of the pages which he tried that displayed a meaning. He had never known this impotence before.
In the midst of these futile attempts to fix his mind on the task before it, he thought he heard the creaking of the stairs. He listened acutely. Late as was the hour, the clerk of some attorney might be bringing him more briefs. A moment later his door was softly tried and opened as softly as some one entered the room.
To the profound astonishment of the young man he saw that it was the figure of a woman. She was tall and pale and clad sombrely in close black draperies. Her entrance was somewhat stealthy, yet it had neither reluctance nor timidity. Unhesitatingly she approached the chair in which the advocate sat with a book on his knee. He rose to greet her with an air of bewilderment.
“I knew you were a great student,” said his visitor in a low voice, letting two large and dark eyes fall upon the page of the book.
“I beg your pardon,” said Northcote, “I am afraid I don’t know you.”
“You do not know me?” said his visitor in a tone that entered his blood. “I will give you a moment to think.”
Northcote seemed to recoil with a half-born pang of recollection which refused to take shape.
“I have not the faintest knowledge of having met you before,” he said, feeling how vain was the effort to fix his thought.
“Think,” said his visitor.
“It is in vain.”