"Five years ago I left the body you knew," replied Thorpe. "I tried to
help you then instinctively, not fully recognising you. But now I can
accomplish far more."

With an awful sense of foreboding and dread in his heart, the secretary
was beginning to understand.

"It has to do with--with--?"

"Your past dealings with the Manager," came the answer, as the wind rose
louder among the branches overhead and carried off the remainder of the
sentence into the air.

Jones's memory, which was just beginning to stir among the deepest
layers of all, shut down suddenly with a snap, and he followed his
companion over fields and down sweet-smelling lanes where the air was
fragrant and cool, till they came to a large house, standing gaunt and
lonely in the shadows at the edge of a wood. It was wrapped in utter
stillness, with windows heavily draped in black, and the clerk, as he
looked, felt such an overpowering wave of sadness invade him that his
eyes began to burn and smart, and he was conscious of a desire to shed
tears.

The key made a harsh noise as it turned in the lock, and when the door
swung open into a lofty hall they heard a confused sound of rustling and
whispering, as of a great throng of people pressing forward to meet
them. The air seemed full of swaying movement, and Jones was certain he
saw hands held aloft and dim faces claiming recognition, while in his
heart, already oppressed by the approaching burden of vast accumulated
memories, he was aware of the _uncoiling of something_ that had been