“Doctor, how in the world do you get all your information?”

“By this and that,” said the Doctor.

“How we are to get at the rebels I can’t see,” said I.

“On the Yorktown end of their line,” replied the Doctor.

“It seems to me a singular coincidence,” said I, “that our troops should have been advancing behind me all day yesterday.”

“Do you object?” he asked.

“Not at all; I was about used up when they found me.  What I should have done I don’t well see.”

“You would have been compelled to start back,” he said.

“Yes,” said I, “and I had no food, and should have been compelled to wait till night to make a start.”

Dr. Khayme was exceedingly cheerful; he smoked incessantly and faster than he usually smoked.  The last thing I can remember before sleep overcame my senses was the thought that the idol’s head looked alive, and that the smoke-clouds which rose above it and half hid the Doctor’s face were not mere forms that would dissipate and be no more; they seemed living beings—­servants attendant on their master’s will.

* * * * *

The next day was cold and damp.  I went out but little.  I wrote some letters, and rested comfortably.  The Doctor gave me the news that Yorktown had been invested, and that there was promise of a siege instead of a battle.

“They have found the Confederate lines too strong to be taken by assault,” said he; “and while McClellan waits for reenforcements, there will be nothing to prevent the Confederates from being reenforced; so mote it be.”

“What!  You are not impatient?”

“Certainly not.”

“And you are willing for the enemy to be reenforced?”

“Oh, yes; I know that the more costly the war the sooner it will end.”

“I think McClellan ought to have advanced before,” said I; “he is likely to lose much time now.”

“He has plenty of time; he has all the time there is.”

“All the time there is! that means eternity.”

“Of course; he has eternity, no more and no less.”

“That is a long time,” said I, thinking aloud.

“And as broad as it is long,” said the Doctor; “everything will happen in that time.”

“To McClellan?”

“Why not to McClellan?  To all.”

“Everything is a big word, Doctor.”

“No bigger than eternity.”

“And McClellan will win and will lose?”

“Yes.”

“I hardly understand, Doctor, what you mean by saying that everything will happen.”

“I mean,” said he, “that change and eternity are all the conditions necessary to cause everything to come to pass.”

“The rebels will win and the North will win?”

“Yes; both of these seemingly contradictory events will happen.”

“You surely are a strange puzzle.”

“I give myself enough time, do I not?”