I have spoken of my experience with the conductor.  On this day I had the certainty of my isolation; it was startling.  In the face of what I was and what I had seen it was almost terrifying.  It was the first time I thought of sending for Hobart.  I had thought I could hold out.  The complete suddenness of the thing set me to thinking.  I thought of Watson.  It was the last phase, the feebleness, the wanness, the inertia!  He had been a far stronger man than I in the beginning.

I must cable Fenton.  While I had still an ego in the presence of men, I must reach out for help.  It was a strange thing and inexplicable.  I was not invisible.  Don’t think that.  I simply did not individualise.  Men didn’t notice me—­till I spoke.  As if I was imperceptibly losing the essence of self.  I still had some hold on the world.  While it remained I must get word to Hobart.  I did not delay.  Straight to the office I went and paid for the cable.

Cannot hold out much longer.  Come at once.—­Harry.

I was a bit ashamed.  I had hoped.  I had counted upon myself.  I had trusted in the full strength of my individuality.  I had been healthy—­strong—­full blooded.  On the fullness of vitality one would live forever.  There is no tomorrow.  It was not a year ago.  I was eighty.  It had been so with Watson.  What was this subtle thing that ate into one’s marrow?  I had read of banshees, lemures and leprechauns; they were the ghosts and the fairies of ignorance but they were not like this.  It was impersonal, hidden, inexorable.  It was mystery.  And I believed that it was Nature.

I know it now.  Even as I write I can sense the potency of the force about me.  Some law, some principle, some force that science has not uncovered.

What is that law that shall bridge the chaos between the mystic and the substantial?  I am standing on the bridge; and I cannot see it.  What is the great law that was discovered by Dr. Holcomb?  Who is the Rhamda?  Who is the Nervina?

Jerome has not returned.  I cannot understand it.  It has been a week.  I am living on brandy—­not much of anything else—­I am waiting for Fenton.  I have taken all my elaborations and notes and put them together.  Perhaps I—­

(This is the last of the strange document left by Harry Wendel.  The following memorandum is written by Charlotte Fenton.)

XVIII

CHARLOTTE’S STORY

I do not know.  It is hard to write after what has happened.

Hobart says that it is why I am to write it.  It is to be a plain narrative.  Besides, he is very busy and cannot do it himself.  There must be some record.  I shall do my best and hold out of my writing as much as I can of my emotion.  I shall start with the Nervina.

It was the first I knew; the first warning.  Looking back I cannot but wonder.  No person I think who has ever seen the Nervina can do much else; she is so beautiful!  Beautiful?  Why do I say it?  I should be jealous and I should hate her.  Yet I do not.  Why is it?