Yet he did not knock. A downward step on the slope of indecision is hard to retrace. He reflected that he would get the _remedium_ in the morning. He would certainly get it. The girl was won over, Basterga was away. Practically, he had no one to fear. And to make a stir when the matter could be arranged without a stir was not the part of a wise man in the position of a magistrate. Slowly he turned and walked away. But, as if his good angel touched him on the shoulder, under the Porte Tertasse he had qualms; and again he stood. And when, after a shorter interval and with less indecision, he resumed his course, it was by no means with the air of a victor. He would receive what he needed in the morning: he dared not admit a doubt of that. And yet--was it a vague presentiment that weighed on him as he walked, or only the wintry night wind that caused the blood to run more slowly and more tamely in his veins? He had not fared ill in his venture, he had made success certain. And yet he was unreasonably, he was unaccountably, he was undefinably depressed. He grew more cheerful when he had had his supper and seated before a half-flagon of wine gave the reins to his imagination. For the space of a golden hour he held the _remedium_ in his grasp, he felt its life-giving influence course through his frame, he tasted again of health and strength and manhood, he saw before him years of success and power and triumph! In comparison to it the bath of Pelias, though endowed with the virtues which lying Medea attributed to it, had not seemed more desirable, nor the elixir of life, nor the herb of Anticyra. Nor was it until he had taken the magic draught once and twice and thrice in fancy, and as often hugged himself on health renewed and life restored that a thought, which had visited him at an earlier period of the evening, recurred and little by little sobered him. This was the reflection that he knew nothing of the quantity of the potion which he must take, nothing of the time or of the manner of taking it. Was it to be taken all at once, or in doses? Pure, or diluted with wine, or with water, or with _aqua vitae_? At any hour, or at midnight, or at a particular epoch of the moon's age, or when this or that star was in the ascendant?