‘I had to bear it, nevertheless. I was aware that I had, in some degree, brought it on myself. If I hadn’t interfered and lied, actual Braxton would have been here at Keeb, and I at this moment sleeping soundly. But this was no excuse for Braxton. Braxton didn’t know what I had done. He was merely envious of me. And--wanly I puzzled it out in the dawn--by very force of the envy, hatred, and malice in him he had projected hither into my presence this simulacrum of himself. I had known that he would be thinking of me. I had known that the thought of me at Keeb Hall would be of the last bitterness to his most sacred feelings. But--I had reckoned without the passionate force and intensity of the man’s nature. ‘If by this same strength and intensity he had merely projected himself as an invisible guest under the Duchess’ roof--if his feat had been wholly, as perhaps it was in part, a feat of mere wistfulness and longing--then I should have felt really sorry for him; and my conscience would have soundly rated me in his behalf. But no; if the wretched creature HAD been invisible to me, I shouldn’t have thought of Braxton at all--except with gladness that he wasn’t here. That he was visible to me, and to me alone, wasn’t any sign of proper remorse within me. It was but the gauge of his incredible ill-will. ‘Well, it seemed to me that he was avenged--with a vengeance. There I sat, hot-browed from sleeplessness, cold in the feet, stiff in the legs, cowed and indignant all through--sat there in the broadening daylight, and in that new evening suit of mine with the Braxtonised shirtfront and waistcoat that by day were more than ever loathsome. Literature’s Ambassador at Keeb.... I rose gingerly from my chair, and caught sight of my face, of my Braxtonised cheek, in the mirror. I heard the twittering of birds in distant trees. I saw through my window the elaborate landscape of the Duke’s grounds, all soft in the grey bloom of early morning. I think I was nearer to tears than I had ever been since I was a child. But the weakness passed. I turned towards the personage on my bed, and, summoning all such power as was in me, WILLED him to be gone. My effort was not without result--an inadequate result. Braxton turned in his sleep. ‘I resumed my seat, and... and... sat up staring and blinking, at a tall man with red hair. “I must have fallen asleep,” I said. “Yessir,” he replied; and his toneless voice touched in me one or two springs of memory: I was at Keeb; this was the footman who looked after me. But--why wasn’t I in bed? Had I--no, surely it had been no nightmare. Surely I had SEEN Braxton on that white bed.