Thus several weeks had passed, and Ernest no longer exclusively occupied her mind when, one day early in September, while glancing over a magazine, she came upon his name in the table of contents.  Once more she saw the boy’s wistful face before her, and a trembling something stirred in her heart.  Her hand shook as she cut the pages, and a mist of tears clouded her vision as she attempted to read his poem.  It was a piece of sombre brilliance.  Like black-draped monks half crazed with mystic devotion, the poet’s thoughts flitted across the page.  It was the wail of a soul that feels reason slipping from it and beholds madness rise over its life like a great pale moon.  A strange unrest emanated from it and took possession of her.  And again, with an insight that was prophetic, she distinctly recognised behind the vague fear that had haunted the poet the figure of Reginald Clarke.

A half-forgotten dream, struggling to consciousness, staggered her by its vividness.  She saw Clarke as she had seen him in days gone by, grotesquely transformed into a slimy sea-thing, whose hungry mouths shut sucking upon her and whose thousand tentacles encircled her form.  She closed her eyes in horror at the reminiscence.  And in that moment it became clear to her that she must take into her hands the salvation of Ernest Fielding from the clutches of the malign power that had mysteriously enveloped his life.

XIX

The summer was brief, and already by the middle of September many had returned to the pleasures of urban life.  Ethel was among the first-comers; for, after her resolve to enter the life of the young poet once more, it would have been impossible for her to stay away from the city much longer.  Her plan was all ready.  Before attempting to see Ernest she would go to meet Reginald and implore him to free the boy from his hideous spell.  An element of curiosity unconsciously entered her determination.  When, years ago, she and Clarke had parted, the man had seemed, for once, greatly disturbed and had promised, in his agitation, that some day he would communicate to her what would exonerate him in her eyes.  She had answered that all words between them were purposeless, and that she hoped never to see his face again.  The experience that the years had brought to her, instead of elucidating the mystery of Reginald’s personality, had, on the contrary, made his behaviour appear more and more unaccountable.  She had more than once caught herself wishing to meet him again and to analyse dispassionately the puzzling influences he had exerted upon her.  And she could at last view him dispassionately; there was triumph in that.  She was dimly aware that something had passed from her, something by which he had held her, and without which his magnetism was unable to play upon her.