he said. "There we were, I and this thin vague ghost, in that silent
room, in this silent, empty inn, in this silent little Friday-night
town. Not a sound except our voices and a faint panting he made when
he swung. There was the bedroom candle, and one candle on the dressing-
table alight, that was all--sometimes one or other would flare up into
a tall, lean, astonished flame for a space. And queer things happened.
'I can't,' he said; 'I shall never--!' And suddenly he sat down on
a little chair at the foot of the bed and began to sob and sob.
Lord! what a harrowing, whimpering thing he seemed!

"'You pull yourself together,' I said, and tried to pat him on the
back, and . . . my confounded hand went through him! By that time,
you know, I wasn't nearly so--massive as I had been on the landing.
I got the queerness of it full. I remember snatching back my hand out
of him, as it were, with a little thrill, and walking over to the
dressing-table. 'You pull yourself together,' I said to him, 'and
try.' And in order to encourage and help him I began to try as well."

"What!" said Sanderson, "the passes?"

"Yes, the passes."

"But--" I said, moved by an idea that eluded me for a space.

"This is interesting," said Sanderson, with his finger in his pipe-
bowl. "You mean to say this ghost of yours gave away--"

"Did his level best to give away the whole confounded barrier? YES."

"He didn't," said Wish; "he couldn't. Or you'd have gone there too."