Page:Richard Marsh--The goddess a demon.djvu/276

264 "That's what it is—a devil's trick! Hers! The Goddess's! She's a demon! I'll—I'll tell you how it was done. She's got me—by the throat; bought me—body and soul. But I don't care, I'll be even. She shan't do all the scoring; I will play a hand, although, directly afterwards, she drags me down to hell with her. Let her drag! I'm in hell already. It can't be worse—where she has sprung from."

Taking Hume by the shoulder with one hand, with the other he pointed to the door which was at the end of the passage. He was dreadful to look at. As he himself said, he already looked as if he were suffering the torments of the damned.

"She's in there—behind that door. But although she is in there she's with me here. She's always with me, wherever I am; she, the face, and the words. You think I'm romancing, passing off on you the coinage of a madman's brain. I would it were so. I wish that they were lies of my own invention, a maniac's imaginings. Come with me; judge for yourself. You shall see her. I will show you how the devil's trick was done."

He led the way along the passage. We followed. I know not what thoughts were in the minds of the others. I do know that I myself had never before been so conscious of a