Charles Harrison was at all times an impatient man, and there were occasions, as in the present case, when his nervous irritability completely overcame him. He was seriously distressed by the thought that Phyllis Messenger had in all probability committed suicide. That touched him on his human, generous side. But the thing that had finally upset him had been the look on Vernon’s face; rapt, faintly mystical, the look of one who believed that a very miracle had been performed for his benefit. Harrison could not endure to remain in his presence for another moment. “I’ll--I’ll go on and see what’s become of Fell,” he mumbled as he fairly scuttled out of the room. Once outside, he began to run. He wanted to think, but his mind was full of exasperation--with Vernon for his look of triumph, with the unfortunate Phyllis Messenger, with the vacillating Robert Fell as the immediate cause of the whole disaster. It seemed to Charles Harrison as if a fortuitous coincidence of events were conspiring against him to produce the illusion of a spiritualistic phenomenon. He did not believe for one moment that the stranger he had seen by the plantation was the spirit of the drowned Phyllis Messenger, but he foresaw the kind of case that Vernon would make out, and the effect it would have upon all the other members of the party. He could not even be sure that his own wife might not be influenced. When that confounded Stevens had hinted at the probability of this girl’s suicide, a very queer expression had come into Emma’s face, just as if she had suddenly realised some strange, significant connection between the possibility of the girl’s death and that other experience earlier in the evening. He had cut hurriedly into the conversation for fear that she might say something foolish.... No, no, the girl could not, must not be dead. They would find her somewhere. And yet, so great was Harrison’s foreboding that he never paused a moment by the yews, but hurried straight on to the shore of the lake. He had seen nothing of Fell. He had indeed forgotten all about him. The night was still clear, but it was no longer frozen into that rigid immobility which had earlier produced so strange an effect of expectancy. There was a perceptible movement of air from the west, the familiar voices of the poplars maintained a perpetual background of sound, and when he had come through the plantation to the edge of the lake, he could hear the minute clashing of the reeds as the chasing ripple of the water set them gently swaying. The air of mystery had fled. He no longer felt the least influence of fear. The dread that he might presently see something that heavily floated, rocking and pressing against the rushes, was more the dread of annoyance.