He rose from the table with a gesture of abrupt impatience and read the entire effusion through from beginning to end. First he laughed, then he sighed. He wondered for a moment how it was that so little of his passion had crept into the poor words. He crumpled up the paper and tossed it into the drawer; and then, blowing out the candles, moved over to the big arm-chair and dropped down into it. Again, as he sat there, his thoughts fell to dramatising his mood. He imagined that region within himself where all might come true, and all yearnings find adequate expression. The idea got more and more mingled with the storm. He pictured it to himself with extraordinarily vivid detail. ‘There _is_ such a place, such a state,’ he murmured, ‘and it is, it must be accessible.’ He heard the clock in the stables—or was it the church—strike the quarter before midnight. As he sat in the big chair, Smoke left the table and curled up again on the mat at his feet. CHAPTER XIV Vision or imagination is a representation of what actually exists, really and unchangeably. He who does not imagine in stronger and better lineaments, and in stronger and better light, than his _perishing_ mortal eye can see, does not imagine at all.—W. B. It was Smoke who first drew his attention to something near the door by ‘padding’ slowly across the carpet and staring up at the handle. Paul’s eyes, following him, perceived next that the brass knob was silently turning. Then the door opened quickly and on the threshold stood—Nixie. The open door made such a draught that the twenty winds tearing about inside the room almost lifted the mat at his feet. Behind her he saw the shadowy outline of a second figure, which he recognised as Jonah. ‘Shut the door—quick!’ he said, but they had done so and were already beside him almost before the words were out of his mouth. In spite of the darkness a very faint radiance came with them so that he could distinguish their faces plainly; and his amazement on seeing them at all at this late hour was instantly doubled when he perceived further that they were fully dressed for going out. At the same time, however, so deep had he been in his reverie, and so strongly did the excitement of it yet linger in his blood, that he hardly realised how wicked they were to be parading the house at such a time of the night, and that his obvious duty was to bundle them back to bed. In a strange, queer way they almost seemed part of his dream, part of his dramatised mood, part of the region of wonder into which his thoughts had been leading him. Moreover, he felt in some dim fashion that they had come with a purpose of great importance. ‘It’s awfully late, you know,’ he exclaimed under his breath, peering into their faces through the darkness.