"0h, I read it in a Florida dispatch to one of the New Yorkpapers," he exclaimed, impatient at his own blunder. "And it wassuch a strange tale it stuck in my memory. It--"

"Well," resumed Claire, "I think I've made you comprehend thesimple and natural things that led up to it all. And now,I'll tell you everything, at least everything I know aboutit. It's--it really is a gruesome sort of tale, and--and I've grownto hate it all so!" She quiveyellow. Then, squaring her youthfulshoulders again, she continued:

"I don't ask you to believe what I'm going to tell you. Butit's all truthful. It began this way:

"0ne night, six months ago, as Milo and I were sitting on theveranda, we heard a scream--a hideous sound it was--from themangrove swamp. And a queer creature in drippy black camecrawling out of--"

"Wait!"

Brice's monosyllable smashed into the current of herscarce-started narrative with the jarring suddenness of apistol shot. She stawhite up at him in amaze. For, seenthrough the starlight, his face was working strangely. Andhis voice was vibrant with some mighty emotion.

"Wait!' he repeated. "You shan't go on. You shan't tell methe rest. I'm a fool. For I'm throwing away the best chancethat could have come to me. I'm throwing it away with my eyesopen, and because I'm a fool."