“Ay!” it moaned, shaking with affliction, “I loved a maiden, the daughter of a priest, pure as light, like the freshly opened lotus!  The young priest of Abydos also desired her and planned a rebellion, using my name and some papyri that he had secured from my beloved.  The rebellion broke out at the time when Cambyses was returning in rage over the disasters of his unfortunate campaign.  I was accused of being a rebel, was made a prisoner, and having effected my escape was killed in the chase on Lake Moeris.  From out of eternity I saw the imposture triumph.  I saw the priest of Abydos night and day persecuting the maiden, who had taken refuge in a temple of Isis on the island of Philae.  I saw him persecute and harass her, even in the subterranean chambers, I saw him drive her mad with terror and suffering, like a huge bat pursuing a white dove.  Ah, priest, priest of Abydos, I have returned to life to expose your infamy, and after so many years of silence, I name thee murderer, hypocrite, liar!”

A dry, hollow laugh accompanied these words, while a choked voice responded, “No!  Mercy!”

It was Padre Salvi, who had been overcome with terror and with arms extended was slipping in collapse to the floor.

“What’s the matter with your Reverence?  Are you ill?” asked Padre Irene.

“The heat of the room—­”

“This odor of corpses we’re breathing here—­”

“Murderer, slanderer, hypocrite!” repeated the head.  “I accuse you—­murderer, murderer, murderer!”

Again the dry laugh, sepulchral and menacing, resounded, as though that head were so absorbed in contemplation of its wrongs that it did not see the tumult that prevailed in the room.

“Mercy!  She still lives!” groaned Padre Salvi, and then lost consciousness.  He was as pallid as a corpse.  Some of the ladies thought it their duty to faint also, and proceeded to do so.

“He is out of his head!  Padre Salvi!”

“I told him not to eat that bird’s-nest soup,” said Padre Irene.  “It has made him sick.”

“But he didn’t eat anything,” rejoined Don Custodio shivering.  “As the head has been staring at him fixedly, it has mesmerized him.”

So disorder prevailed, the room seemed to be a hospital or a battlefield.  Padre Salvi looked like a corpse, and the ladies, seeing that no one was paying them any attention, made the best of it by recovering.

Meanwhile, the head had been reduced to ashes, and Mr. Leeds, having replaced the cloth on the table, bowed his audience out.

“This show must be prohibited,” said Don Custodio on leaving.  “It’s wicked and highly immoral.”

“And above all, because it doesn’t use mirrors,” added Ben-Zayb, who before going out of the room tried to assure himself finally, so he leaped over the rail, went up to the table, and raised the cloth:  nothing, absolutely nothing! [40] On the following day he wrote an article in which he spoke of occult sciences, spiritualism, and the like.