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“Well?”

“He refused.”

“It is closed by my orders.”

“That settles it, of course. The manner of Johnson’s refusal was a bit uncivil, but–“

He had been looking at me intently all this time–so intently that I was conscious of a little embarrassment and confusion. His mouth was set like a dash between brackets, and his eyes glistened. Now his features relaxed, and he gave a short high neigh of a laugh.

“My dear fellow, you must make allowances for the rough old lurcher. He was a soldier. He is all cut and measured out to the regimental pattern. With him Major Shrike, like the king, can do no wrong. Did I ever tell you he served under me in India? He did; and, moreover, I saved his life there.”

“In an engagement?”

“Worse–from the bite of a snake. It was a mere question of will. I told him to wake and walk, and he did. They had thought him already in rigor mortis; and, as for him–well, his devotion to me since has been single to the last degree.”

“That’s as it should be.”

“To be sure. And he’s quite in my confidence. You must pass over the old beggar’s churlishness.”

I laughed an assent. And then an odd thing happened. As I spoke, I had walked over to a bookcase on the opposite side of the room to that on which my host stood. Near this bookcase hung a mirror–an oblong affair, set in brass repousse work–on the wall; and, happening to glance into it as I approached, I caught sight of the Major’s reflection as he turned his face to follow my movement.

I say “turned his face”–a formal description only. What met my startled gaze was an image of some nameless horror–of features grooved, and battered, and shapeless, as if they had been torn by a wild beast.

I gave a little indrawn gasp and turned about. There stood the Major, plainly himself, with a pleasant smile on his face.

“What’s up?” said he.

He spoke abstractedly, pulling at his cigar; and I answered rudely, “That’s a damned bad looking-glass of yours!”

“I didn’t know there was anything wrong with it,” he said, still abstracted and apart. And, indeed, when by sheer mental effort I forced myself to look again, there stood my companion as he stood in the room.

I gave a tremulous laugh, muttered something or nothing, and fell to examining the books in the case. But my fingers shook a trifle as I aimlessly pulled out one volume after another.

“Am I getting fanciful?” I thought–“I whose business it is to give practical account of every bugbear of the nerves. Bah! My liver must be out of order. A speck of bile in one’s eye may look a flying dragon.”

I dismissed the folly from my mind, and set myself resolutely to inspecting the books marshalled before me. Roving amongst them, I pulled out, entirely at random, a thin, worn duodecimo, that was thrust well back at a shelf end, as if it shrank from comparison with its prosperous and portly neighbours. Nothing but chance impelled me to the choice; and I don’t know to this day what the ragged volume was about. It opened naturally at a marker that lay in it–a folded slip of paper, yellow with age; and glancing at this, a printed name caught my eye.

With some stir of curiosity, I spread the slip out. It was a title-page to a volume, of poems, presumably; and the author was James Shrike.

I uttered an exclamation, and turned, book in hand.

“An author!” I said. “You an author, Major Shrike!”

To my surprise, he snapped round upon me with something like a glare of fury on his face. This the more startled me as I believed I had reason to regard him as a man whose principles of conduct had long disciplined a temper that was naturally hasty enough.

Before I could speak to explain, he had come hurriedly across the room and had rudely snatched the paper out of my hand.