It was one of these restless nights towards the middle of June. All day long he had been hard at work and almost unconscious of any special pain. It had been sultry exceedingly, the skies like molten-brass, save over the western horizon, where leaden-coloured clouds were gathering in battalions, and the touch of the earth like a thrice-heated furnace. Tom, who was so much exhausted that he thought he must sleep, visited the little Aglaia, as was his nightly custom, listened for a few moments to the prattle of her and her ayah, and then retired to his own apartment. It was in this room that the late rajah had breathed his last; on which account partly, and also for its space and coolness, and the beautiful view from its low latticed windows of the fantastic Indian garden, and the little azure blue lake, and the low green hills behind the city, Tom had chosen it for its own. When he went in that night he found it dimly lighted by heavy wax candles that stood in sconces against the wall; the water in the marble canal that intersected it and in the small fountain that sprang from a basin in a recess at its upper end murmured dreamily, and through one of the lattices there stole in the silver rays of a young moon. At first the space and silence had a soothing effect upon him. He flung off the sword which he had been carrying all day, drew his revolver out of his belt, and threw himself down, just as he was, on one of the thick padded mattresses that lay on the marble floor. But he could not sleep. The moment he laid his head down upon his pillow the torturing thoughts began again, and he was obliged at last to spring from his bed, and to court the physical weariness which might bring sleep by pacing his room rapidly. The heat was stifling, or was it the fever in his blood? He could not tell; but he thought that, with all his strange experiences, he had never felt so strange as now, and for a few moments he forgot everything, even to the horror that was continually haunting him, in watching his own sensations.