"The strain," he began again, "of putting an end to your last experiment has told on me. I overdid it. Such emotion, and such physical tension, is more than I should have attempted. I begin to fear I may not last very long. And in that case I think I shall have to take my secret with me. Orson, it comes to this; I am too old to perfect this marvelous thing to the point where it will be safe for humanity at large. It is still unsafe,--you will agree to that. You might wreck your own life and that of others. The chances are one in a thousand of your ever finding a human being whom God has so graciously endowed with the divine spirit as to be able to lose part of it without collapse. I have hoped and hoped, that such a thing would happen; then there would be two perfectly even, exactly tempered creatures; even if, upon that transfusion, the mirror disappeared, there would be no unhappiness as a reproach. But we have found nothing like that. You have embittered yourself; the glimpses of other souls you have had have almost stripped you of your belief in an eternal Good." "You mean to send for the mirror?" "It would be better, wiser. If I live, it will still be here. If I die, it must be destroyed. In any event--" At the actual approach of this conclusion to his experiments Orson Vane felt a sense of coming loss. With all the dangers, all the loom of possible disaster, he was not yet rid of the awful fascination of this soul-snatching he had been engaged in. "Perhaps," he argued, "my next experiment might find the one in a thousand you spoke of." "I think you had better not try again. Tell me, what was Wantage's soul like?" "Oh, I cannot put it into words. A little, feverish, fretful soul, shouting, all the time: I, I, I! Plotting, planning for public attention, worldly prominence. No thoughts save those of self. An active brain, all bent on the ego. A brain that deliberately chose the theatre because it seems the most spectacular avenue to eminence. A magnetism that keeps outsiders wondering whether childishness or genius lurks behind the mask. The bacillus of restlessness is in that brain; it is never idle, always planning a new pose for the body and the voice." "Well," urged Vanlief, "think what might have been had I not put a stop to the thing. You don't realize the terrible anxiety I was in. You might have ruined the man's career. However petty we, you and I, may hold him, there are things the world expects of him; we came close to spoiling all that. I had to act, and quickly. You may fancy the difficulties of getting the mirror to Wantage. Oh, it is still all like an evil dream." He lay silent a while, then resumed: "Is the mirror in the old room?" "Yes. With the others, in the dressing-room." "Nevins looks out for it?" "As always. Though he grows old, too." Vanlief looked sharply at Orson, he suspected something behind that phrase about Nevins. Again he urged: "Better have Nevins bring the mirror back to me."