"I mean, Dr. Morton, that, since you assure me that there is no presence in this room other than our own, I must possess some species of clairvoyance which my present condition induces. I assure you that there is a third presence here, that completely overshadows you! The consciousness of this fact freezes my very marrow and chills my being with the chill of death. It is by no means the first time that I have experienced these baleful sensations, or I should not have come to you for advice and counsel. Heaven knows I have no wish to be cognizant of these occult matters; but I am completely powerless to struggle against them. Ah, me!" she sighed wearily, "had I lived in the days of witchcraft, I suppose I should have been burned at the stake, despite my innocence."
Her voice sank to a whisper, and with its cadence her eye-lids drooped and closed; her breathing became stertorous, while her teeth ground each other with an appalling suggestion of physical agony, of which her body gave no evidence, being quiescent.
Startled though he was, Morton's first suspicion was that he was being made the victim of some clever imposture. This fancy, however, soon gave place to a belief that he was witnessing some sort of refined hysteria. Were the latter supposition the case, he felt himself equal to the emergency.
He leaned forward and placed his hands firmly upon the shoulders of the inanimate woman. "Enough of this, Mrs. Revaleon!" he exclaimed in a firm voice; "if I am to assist you, you must assist me! I command you to open your eyes!"
Not so much as a nerve vibrated in the corpse-like figure.
Aroused to a determination to thoroughly investigate the phenomenon, Morton quickly ignited a candle, and, holding it in one hand, he passed it close to the woman's eyes, the heavy lids of which he alternately raised with the fingers of his disengaged hand.
The eyes returned a dull, sightless glare to the test.
As a last resort to arouse consciousness or discover imposture, he produced a delicate lancet, and, raising the lace about the woman's wrist, he lightly scarified the cold, white flesh. Blood sluggishly tinged the slight abrasion, but, to his amazement, the immobility of his subject failed to relax one jot; yet the experiment was not entirely without result, since at the same moment a voice, muffled and far away in sound, broke the expectant silence:
"Loyd! Loyd!"
The twilight had deepened to actual gloom, which the flickering of the weird candle-light but served to accentuate. It seemed impossible to establish evidence to prove that it was the lips of Margaret Revaleon that had framed the thrilling utterance; indeed, the eerie tone could be likened to nothing human.