‘That was the beginning,’ Graham murmured. ‘Do you know that from that day until last night I have never dreamed of you, nor of the place where I used to find you ... never till last night.’ ‘And last night you _did_?’ Graham glanced up at his companion. ‘It all came back,’ he answered simply. ‘You were there――just as before I went to school――but changed――a little changed.’ He tried to remember. ‘I can’t exactly say what the difference was,’ he went on slowly, turning it over in his mind. Then he paused, in his effort to puzzle it out? ‘_Why_ should you have come back?――after so long, I mean. Why, if you _were_ coming, should you not have come sooner?’ ‘Ah, I can’t tell you,’ smiled Brocklehurst. ‘Perhaps if you had asked me last night――――!’ ‘You would have told me?... You did tell me, but I don’t remember what you said. Somehow it has all grown very dim. Your being with me here, I think, has thrown the other back.’ ‘But wasn’t it to tell you something that I returned?’ A peculiar, half-baffled expression passed across Graham’s face. ‘I thought I was going to remember,’ he sighed, ‘but it has gone again.... I suppose I shall never know now.’ ‘Ah, well, I can’t help you any further.’ Brocklehurst watched him with some amusement. ‘No.’ He sighed again. Then he looked across once more at his companion. ‘As soon as I fell asleep I saw him――my dream-boy. I awoke, it seemed, on the sea-shore, at the very gate of his garden. And I heard his voice calling me――calling, calling.... Oh, I remembered his voice so well! I opened the gate, and he was there.’ He paused a moment, and his eyes grew dark with a strange shadow. And it was through this shadow that his next words seemed to drop, his voice becoming lower and lower, till at length it was scarce audible, scarce more than a whisper. ‘Who he is, what he is; if he indeed be your spirit, or if you only remind me of him, I suppose I shall never know. At times I think he must have been born with me, and have grown with the growth of my soul. Until I went to school, at any rate, as I have already told you, he was my only playmate. When I was a little boy I used to pretend he was in the garden with me, and I used to look for him here and there, just as if he were hiding from me in some game.... At night, I remember, when I had got into bed I used to wonder where he was just then, and if he would be waiting for me when I woke up in his country. And he always _was_ waiting――standing there patiently, smiling, ready to welcome me.... Now and then I even went to bed earlier than usual, to see if I could by any chance get there before him; but I never could, because, I suppose, he lived there....