another book, _The King in Yellow_." I looked him steadily in the
eye.

"Have you never read it?" I asked.

"I? No, thank God! I don't want to be driven crazy."

I saw he regretted his speech as soon as he had uttered it. There is only
one word which I loathe more than I do lunatic and that word is crazy.
But I controlled myself and asked him why he thought _The King in
Yellow_ dangerous.

"Oh, I don't know," he said, hastily. "I only remember the excitement it
created and the denunciations from pulpit and Press. I believe the author
shot himself after bringing forth this monstrosity, didn't he?"

"I understand he is still alive," I answered.

"That's probably true," he muttered; "bullets couldn't kill a fiend like
that."

"It is a book of great truths," I said.

"Yes," he replied, "of 'truths' which send men frantic and blast their
lives. I don't care if the thing is, as they say, the very supreme
essence of art. It's a crime to have written it, and I for one shall
never open its pages."

"Is that what you have come to tell me?" I asked.