I pulled myself together with an effort and followed him more closely. We passed under a bridge of solid masonry, moss-encrusted, and indented with the storms of ages and the ruder marks of battering-ram and cannon, across a wide, circular courtyard protected by massive iron gates, which rolled slowly open before us with many ponderous creakings and gratings, as though reluctant to admit a stranger, into a great, white, stone-paved hall, dimly lighted, yet sufficiently so to enable me to perceive the long rows of armoured warriors which lined the walls, and the lances and spears and shields which flashed above their heads. We passed straight across it, our footsteps awakening clattering echoes as they fell on the polished flags, through a door on the opposite side, into a room which nearly took my breath away. From the high, vaulted ceiling to the floor, on every side of the apartment, were books--nothing but books. Two men--one old, the other of about my own age--looked up from a table as we entered and paused in their work, which seemed to be cataloguing; but my guide passed them without remark or notice, and walked straight across the room to where a crimson curtain, hanging down in thick folds, concealed a black oak door. Here he knocked, and I waited by his side until the answer came in that clear, low tone, which, though I had heard it but once or twice before, I could have recognised in a thousand. Then my guide turned the handle and, silently motioning me to enter, left me. CHAPTER IX. MR. MARX. At first I had eyes only for the dark figure seated a few yards away from me at a small writing-table drawn into the centre of the room. He was bending low over his desk and never even raised his eyes or ceased writing at my entrance. Before him on the table, and scattered around his chair on the floor, were many sheets of white foolscap covered with his broad, firm handwriting, some with the ink scarcely dry upon them; and while I stood before him he impatiently swept another one from his desk and, without waiting to see it flutter to the ground, began a fresh sheet. A glass of water, a few dry biscuits, and a little pile of books--some turned face-downwards--were by his side. Nothing else was on the table, save a great pile of unused paper, a watch detached from its chain, and a heavily-shaded lamp, which threw a ghastly light upon his white, worn face, and his dry, brilliant eyes, under which were faintly engraven the dark rims of the student.