The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-12-07

state ID which he was plunged.
Some mysterious power held him
charmed.
Suddenly / released my hold OF
the mans hands, and in an instant
the illusion vanished. Twas dunn
founded. Again I seized his hands
and held them, one in each of my
own. Gradually, as dream grows
into life, l was conscious of innumer-
able things passing swiftly before
me, unintelligible and with a sense
of infinite woe.
BY the workings of the mans face
I was sure that, by some morbid
sympathy, the mirage was visible
in both, for perceived that l might,
by the mere lifting of his hands,
coniure the scene or disperse it BY
releasing them. It struck me like
a forcible recollection of De Quin-
cey's opium dreams, especially that
last related terrible vision.
experienced a sickening nausea
and was forced to again relax my
hold. The empty train was still
travelling alongside us, thus form
ing magic mirror where furtive
lights played. I crossed to the other
window of the carriage and looked
out. All was blackness, impenetra-
bly, dark. / came back and once
more seized the mans hands.
Some terrible drama, I felt con-
scious, was about to be enacted.
Whence came this strange present.
ment9 / saw a face distinctly mir
rored on the dark pane. Yet not
one face alone. Others there were,
familiar and recognizable. Iglanced
instantly at the face of the stranger.
The face, that terrible first face,
was his own. Then, whether sleep
ing or waking, in act or in fancy or
whether in that mystic interspace
between the real and the unreal, it
faded through the gloom and be-
came suddenly transported to a
room filled on all sides with books.
/ understood it to be a library. a
man sat reading alone, with a lamp
beside him..
So sudden had been tho removal
that 1 knew not when or how it
came. The man at the table rose as
he entered and beckoned him to a
seat opposite. He mado some mute
request, which I neither heard nor
comprebended. l knew only that
the man was obdurate. Meekly he
urz, "a his petition, and still he ap-
peared to refuse him. There was
anger on both their faces. In min
ute the stranger raised his hand and
dealt the other a blow across the ta-
Bile. He struck him to the floor. The
blood streaned from his face, yet
once more he gained his feet and
stood confronting him. The blood
ragged in his own veins, and he struck
out with all the fcrce OF q great
strength. This time the man did not
rise, and he stopped to look into his
face.
1 struggled to break away from
the sckening nightmare of blood,
but was powerless looked again,
now only upon the face Of the van
cuished, and it was not the same. I
knew that it was the face of the
man beside me which I now beheld
Pale and distorted it looked, the eyes
bursting from their sockets and the
lips foaming in the final throes.
About his neck was rope, tighten
ed SO that he could not breathe. I
knew all this and more. Tie sensa-
ton grew upon me. He choked, he
gasped. The lights went out.
No; it was I that choked. The
blood surged through my brain like
an Atlantic current. Ten thousand
whirlpools burst wildly around me,
bearing me. down, down to unutter-
able depths, while the weight of
fathomless oceans lay upon me.
Cries and lamentations rose upon
every hand-utter, heartending cries
from the uttermost abysses. Weird
faces Knocked at me and called me- a
name at which strong men grow
pale and the legions Of he:11 tremblc
Darkling lay, oppressed and ut
terly confounded, it seemed, for long
ages of smmeasurable time. At
length light broke in, the tulnult
subsidized, the voices became gradual
ly less. Suddenly the phantaslna
faded from the darEened pane, Civ
ing place to a fierce, lurid light, and,
with start, l broke away as the
train snorted into the great termi-
nus.
The train came to q stop. rose
and looked at the opposite seat. The
man had already alighted, for the
carriage door stood open. Not a
word had passed 1 made only a dim
conjecture of things. sat with my
eyes upon the place ho had occupied.
l knew that what I had seen he had
seen also. I knew that hideous
secret had suddenly passed into my
keeping. / started up. Did he know