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Ordinarily he would have taken a quiet hour in the evening to think it all over carefully, but as it happened like Lord George Germaine and the dispatch to Burgoyne social engagements rushed forward to occupy his time. Next morning his mail brought several letters, urging him to set his foot ruthlessly on the serpent-head of hazing. His telephone rang with the same firm counsel.

Did he not know, only too well, that Satan avails himself of every wile to insinuate his serpent-head into the soul, even when it is absorbed in self-examination? No! no! he had no excuse. His illness had in no wise authorised him to sin. He should have set strict guard upon himself, and have sought God anew upon recovering from his fever.

One word, in truth, had alarmed her more than battles or sieges, during which she trusted Raymond's high command would exempt him from danger. That word, as yet it was not more to her, was PLAGUE. This enemy to the human race had begun early in June to raise its serpent-head on the shores of the Nile; parts of Asia, not usually subject to this evil, were infected.

"Well, then I WON'T be sorry; I won't regret anything except that our good time is over!" The words were so unexpected that they routed all his resolves. If she had gone on doubting him he could probably have gone on deceiving her; but her unhesitating acceptance of his word made him hate the part he was playing. At the same moment a doubt shot up its serpent-head in his own bosom.

He was shut in with the SNAKE. At last it had come for him in its own concrete form and had him bound and gagged by fascination and fear in the Dark, the awful cruel Dark. No more mere myrmidons. The SNAKE ITSELF. He tried to scream and could not. He tried to strike out at an imaginary serpent-head, huge as an elephant, that reared itself above him and could not.