’"Then,” I said, “an artist’s success depends a great deal upon his model?  I had no idea of such a thing.”

’"It does indeed,” he said.  “Such success as I have won since my great loss is very largely owing to those two ladies, one so grand and the other so sweet, whom you are admiring.”

’The way in which he spoke the words “since my great loss” almost brought tears into my eyes.  He then went round the room, and explained in a delightful way the various pictures and objects of interest.  I felt that I was preventing him from working, and told him so.

’"You are very thoughtful,” he said, “but I can only paint when I feel the impulse within me, and to-day I am lazy.  But while you go and get your luncheon—­I do not lunch myself—­I must try to do something.  You must have many matters of your own that you would like to attend to.  Will you return to the studio about five o’clock, and let me have your company in another walk?”

’Until five o’clock I was quite alone, and wandered about the house and garden trying my memory as to whether I could recall something, but in vain.  At any other time than this I should no doubt have found the old house a very fascinating one; but not for two minutes together could my mind dwell upon anything but the amazing situation in which I found myself.  The house was, I saw, built of grey stone, and as it had seven gables it suggested to me Nathaniel Hawthorne’s famous story, of which my aunt was so fond.  Inside I found every room to be more or less interesting.  But what attracted me most, I think, was a series of large attics in which was a number of enormous oak beams supporting the antique roof.  With the sunlight pouring through the windows and illuminating almost every corner, the place seemed cheerful enough, but I could not help thinking how ghostly it must look on a moonlight night.

’While the thought was in my mind, a strangle sensation came upon me.  I seemed to hear a moan; it came through the door of the large attic adjoining the one in which I stood, and then I heard a voice that seemed familiar to me, and yet I could not recall it.  It was repeating in a loud, agonised tone the words of that curse written on the parchment scroll which I picked up on Raxton sands.  I was so astonished that for a long time I could think of nothing else.

IX

’At five o’clock I was going towards the studio to keep my appointment when I met Mr. D’Arcy in his broad-brimmed felt hat, ready and waiting for me to take the proposed walk with him.

’Oh, what a lovely afternoon it was!  A Welsh afternoon could not have been lovelier.  In fact, it carried my mind back here.  The sun, shining on the buttercups and the grey-tufted standing grass, made the meadows look as though covered with a tapestry that shifted from grey to lavender, and then from lavender to gold, as the soft breeze moved over it.  And many of the birds were still in full song; and brilliant as was the music of the skylarks, the blackbirds and thrushes were so numerous that the music falling from the sky seemed caught and swallowed up by the music rising from the hedgerows and trees.