Page:Doughty--Mirrikh or A woman from Mars.djvu/113

 Over her head a veil of some filmy material was thrown which practically hid her features. She raised her hands and threw the veil toward me as she glided past—I felt its  touch upon my face—it was real!

“Maurice! I must wake Maurice!” flashed over me. “I must know whether these are dreams or not!”

Useless! If a mountain had stood there ready to fall and crush me, I could neither have moved nor spoken a word.

With a quick, gliding motion the veiled woman now approached the body of Mr. Mirrikh, and bending down began making passes over the face, exactly as I have since seen a  hypnotizer work upon his subject.

I watched her. Never for an instant were my eyes removed from her. She was wondrously beautiful—divine!

Moment succeeded moment. Still the veiled woman was there—still those slender, snow white hands moved to and  fro over the face of the corpse.

Presently a strange thing occurred—so strange that it were better omitted, were it not that I have sworn to keep nothing back.

Now as I watched the veiled form, I perceived that it was growing smaller—growing thin and vapory, just as I had  seen Mr. Mirrikh turn into vapor in the alley, at Panompin,  on that ever memorable night.

Then, all in an instant, the hands ceased to move and the form sank down upon the floor, an unmeaning mass of white  drapery, which for a second seemed to glow with singular  phosphorescence, and then

Presto!

It was gone!

The veiled woman was no longer there!

Terror now seized me. I tried again to move—to reach Maurice and awaken him, but a power incomprehensible still held me down.

I was conscious, yet helpless. My soul was keenly alive to everything, but the power of controlling the body it inhabited seemed to have been taken away.

There was just one thing I could do and that was to keep my eyes fixed upon the particular spot on the floor where  the vapory form had vanished.

Soon I beheld a round phosphorescent spot of light, which seemed to exactly fill the space upon which my vision was  concentrated and no more.