I believe it is not an uncommon thing for a sentinel to slumber at his post, and wake to find himself still in a standing posture. To the ordinary mortal, however, this would certainly be a novel experience.  
Judge, then, of my surprise, on returning to a state of consciousness, to discover that I was on my feet in an erect position with my back against what seemed to be a stone pillar. It is not quite correct to define my attitude as "erect:" leaning forward would more aptly describe it. My balance was maintained by a contrivance of somewhat sinister significance. My hands were extended almost horizontally behind me, one on each side of the pillar, my wrists being firmly secured to each other by something which, judging by the sense of touch was a silken sash so twined and twisted as to serve the same purpose as a strong cord. My arms ached with the pain arising from the unnatural position in which they were sustained; and my head throbbed acutely, probably from the effects of the drug exhaled by the phial.
 
In what place I stood it was impossible to tell, for there lay a darkness all around as black and oppressive as though a pall had been flung over me. Fear imparts the wildest fancies to the human mind. My first impression was that I had awoke on the other side of the[Pg 252] dark river that parts this world from the next, and that my eyes, so soon as they were able to pierce the gloom, would discover scenes more terrible than those imagined by the genius of Dante.
 
Reverting, however, to the train of events that had brought me to the state of unconsciousness, I came to the more rational conclusion that I was still in the Nuns' Tower. The stone column to which I was attached was without doubt the pillar that upheld the arched roof of the studio-cell; and the silken fabric that bound my hands, I felt intuitively, was the purple curtain that, earlier in the day, had been hung over the casement.
 
My eyes, becoming by slow degrees accustomed to the darkness, discerned through the penumbra around me a grey oblong object elevated in air and crowned with a triangular apex, which finally resolved itself into the shape of a Gothic casement; and then little by little the whole perspective of the studio-cell became dimly outlined on my vision; and there, by the side of the table, within the oaken chair, sat a figure.
 
My first impulse was to shout for help, but I checked myself lest such cry should be the signal for my mysterious captor to despatch me. How he had gained access to the cell was evident.
 
At a point equidistant from the window and the door a slab of stone that formed a part of the flooring was raised, and reclined obliquely against the wall. Beneath the place where it had lain an opening yawned, and the faint outline of steps going downwards proved the truth of the statement contained in the addendum to the antiquary's book that there was another mode of communicating with the tower besides the ordinary way of the door.
 
I turned my staring eyeballs towards the shape at[Pg 253] the table. It was too dark at first for me to distinguish his features, but the contour of the figure seemed to suggest the personality of Angelo. By and by the obscurity of the cell became faintly illumined by the withdrawal of some dark clouds from the face of the sky, and I saw that my captor was indeed the artist. Clad in a dark velvet jacket, he sat with his hands clasped at the back of his head, and one leg thrown carelessly over the other.
 
I had not expected my captor to be any one else than Angelo, and yet the recognition seemed to come upon me as a surprise.
 
I shall not pretend to be a hero, and say that the recognition brought with it no fear. It did indeed bring a very great pang of fear. I felt such a sensation then as I never before felt and never wish to feel again.
 
I was a captive in the power of a rival who hated me with all the hatred of a hatred-loving race. I had sneered at him and at his adored art. I had robbed him of Daphne, depriving him by that act of a figure whose beauty would be an acquisition to his studio. I had little to hope from his mercy.
 
Preserving with difficulty my presence of mind, I manipulated the silken bands on my wrists in the hope of releasing myself, but Angelo had performed his task too well to permit this. It was evident that my earthly salvation was not within my own power. It must come—if it should come at all—from without. With a terror that increased moment by moment, I recognised how hopeless was my situation.
 
True, the Baronet and my uncle would miss me on their return, and, conjecturing that I had gone to the Nuns' Tower, might come to seek me, but their aid would be of no avail, for, even if they should come[Pg 254] with a body of servants armed with axes, it would take them a minute at least to force open the strong oaken door—ample time for the artist to compass his work of vengeance and escape by the secret passage.
 
What men usually do when nothing else is left for them to do, I did. The first really fervent prayer that I ever breathed rose to my lips.
 
As I could see Angelo's eyes quite plainly, I concluded he could see mine, and hence he must have perceived that I had recovered from my state of lethargy. He did not speak, however, but continued to look at me, as if my captivity were a luxury too rich for words. Several minutes passed, and at last the silence became so oppressive that I could bear it no longer, and I said:
 
"Was it you who bound me like this?"
 
"It was."
 
A brief reply—delivered in a cool tone of voice, too, as if the seizure and binding of a gentleman to a Gothic pillar was an every-day event with him, and of too trifling a character to require any comment or apology.
 
"Confound your ill-timed jest! Cut these cords at once, before my cries bring assistance."
 
The artist took up from the table the poniard with the red stain on its blade, and proceeded to sharpen the edge on a square slab of marble that did duty occasionally as a palette. Silly that I was! I actually believed that my bold manner had frightened him, and that he was going to comply with my request. The noise produced by the sharpening process was not a pleasant one, and it set my teeth on edge.
 
"Oh, that'll do!" I cried impatiently—that is, impatiently for a captive, dependent on the pleasure of[Pg 255] another for his release. "That'll do. It's sharp enough for the purpose."
 
"Pardon me, no," he replied, lifting his eyes from the dagger to contemplate me for a moment. "It's not sharp enough for the purpose."
 
Something in the intonation of his voice drove out the last traces of the drug, and restored me instantly to the full use of my faculties, as drunken men are said to become sobered by a sudden shock.
 
"What are you going to do?" I cried.
 
As if there could be any doubt in the matter!
 
"Immortalise you by my art."
 
If he had said that he was going to take vengeance on a rival whom he hated I should have understood him, but this speech of his was unintelligible.
 
"What are you going to do, I ask?"
 
"I have told you: make a sacrifice on the altar of art."
 
"What on earth do you mean?" I cried, tugging at my bonds.
 
"That picture," replied the artist, pausing in his occupation to point with his dagger at the canvas on the easel; "that picture is at a standstill for want of an appropriate model. I have found my model."
 
With parted lips and dilated eyes I gazed at the speaker, wondering whether he were in earnest. His easy air of unconcern inspired me with false hopes. He was only acting the part of a would-be assassin, I thought. It was a jest of his to frighten me. A trick to compel me perhaps to forswear all claim to Daphne.
 
"Do you hope to frighten me by these tricks?" I cried, assuming a courage I did not feel. "I have but to raise my voice——"
 
"Raise it, then."
 
There was a look in his eyes, a motion of the dagger that convinced me I had better not.
 
"You are wise. Your silence has added a few moments to your brief span of life."
 
If there had been a tremor in his voice, if his features had relaxed from their set expression, I could have hoped then that his humanity might yet triumph over the impulse of crime. But this cold, mechanical calmness—it was even a more frightful thing than the deed he was contemplating.
 
"Would you murder me for the sake of a picture?" I asked in as quiet a tone as I could assume.
 
"Killing in the interests of art is not murder, any more than the burning of a heretic in the interests of holy religion is murder."
 
It was evident that the Italian was in deadly earnest, and that his whole soul was absorbed by one passion—devotion to his art. In the interests of that fetish, crime even was excusable. This is the age of realism—of a realism that too often dispenses with morality. Angelo's ?sthetics of death was but the logical outcome of the realistic school.
 
The artist had imparted the necessary edge to his weapon, and reclined once more in an easy attitude, fingering the blade with a delicate touch, and surveying my form with a critical eye.
 
"I cannot say that you are quite the beau-ideal for an artist. A little more massiveness in your figure, a little more muscular development of the limbs, would be more in accordance with the canons of physical beauty. Still, these little imperfections can be rectified on the canvas."
 
The mockery of this remark was not accompanied by any relaxation of his features. He might have[Pg 257] been wearing a stone mask, so little mobility did his face display.
 
"Nor can I say that your present expression is precisely that which a dying Christian ought to assume. There is an appreciable want of resignation in it. Still, it is within the power of my pencil to transfigure your face with the divine light of martyrdom, thus conferring upon you an immortality on canvas—an eternity of fame which assuredly you would never gain by the productions of your pen, though literature, we know, be your forte."
 
This last was a mocking allusion to a boast of mine made at Rivoli.
 
A devilish motive prompting these remarks was obvious. He wanted to apply torture to the mind before applying it to the body. He felt that the captive was the true victor; for though he might slay me, yet the deed would never make Daphne his. I longed to taunt him with this, and to hurl back gibe for gibe. Prudence restrained me, however. A rash retort might precipitate matters, and cause him to execute his deadly work sooner than he intended; and delay was of value to me, for as the human mind abandons hope only with the last breath, so did I cling to the expectation that rescue might come in a shape I did not dream of. Therefore I listened to the artist without saying a word.
 
"Some weeks ago I learned that you and Daphne were to spend your Christmas at the Abbey. I prepared for the event. I had vowed that, living or dead, Daphne should minister to the success of my picture, and since I could not have the living woman, I resolved to have her dead form; it would suit my purpose equally well—perhaps better. I have learnt a little of the topography of the Abbey. A secret passage [Pg 258]connecting this tower with the bedchambers furnished me with the ready means for carrying her off to my studio in the darkness of the night. This phial here," holding up the bottle that he had evidently removed from my breast-pocket, where I had placed it—"you have had some experience of it yourself—applied to her pretty nostrils would be an instant balm for hysterics. However, my scheme of last night miscarried—through you. Therefore you take her place. You have prevented me from adequately realising my conception of the sweet and sad death-beauty of a girl-martyr. Art demands, then, that you atone for your intervention by becoming the substitute. Behold, martyr, your attire!" he added, turning to the table and lifting up the different articles composing the Roman costume.
 
Replacing them, he took up the ivory paw whose use had so much puzzled me.
 
"You see this? To lacerate your naked body with—to give to its quivering white the very wounds that a lion's claws would inflict. My own invention—exclusively my own."
 
He spoke of his projected task in as cool a tone as a scientist might use in speaking of the dissection of a dog.
 
"You see," he continued, laying down the claw, "this is the age of realism. Nothing is now accepted in literature, art, or the drama that does not bear on its front the stamp of reality. Art, if it is to hold the mirror up to Nature, must not shrink any more than medical science from experimenting on the living frame, and analysing with delicate eye its varying phases of agony."
 
He paused for a moment, and then, with the air of a man arriving at the end of a set oration, he said:
 
"You now have my secret. Know, then, how I[Pg 259] intend to produce on that canvas the dying agonies of Modestus the martyr—the picture destined to create an epoch in the history of modern art. So soon as the church-bells chime the hour of midnight you are dead. Such is Daphne's wish."
 
"Daphne's!" I ejaculated.
 
"Ay! She wishes for your death. She has promised to marry me to-night. Did you not know?"
 
He spoke in so natural a tone that I could but stare fixedly at him, wondering what his motive could be in fabricating so wild a statement. My look of perplexity was so great that the artist laughed aloud. This was the first time his facial muscles had relaxed. The transition from rigidity to mobility was not an agreeable one.
 
A terrible metamorphosis was coming over the artist. It seemed as if some part of his nature, that he had long kept hidden, was rising up to the surface. It did arise—fast. It revealed itself in his unearthly laugh, in the distortion of his mouth, in the wild light of his eyes, in the goblin attitude he had suddenly assumed with his head sunk forward on his breast and his crooked fingers clawing at the air.
 
His head sunk forward on his breast
Angelo was mad!
 
Mad! Why had I not guessed this before? A thousand circumstances—curious facial expressions, odd sayings, tricks of gesture—came welling up from the depths of the past. Trivial, considered apart, in the aggregate they were significant, and tended to confirm my terrible discovery.
 
This revelation of Angelo's character imparted a fresh element of horror to my situation, and reduced to a minimum my chances of escape. Angelo sane might perhaps be diverted from his deadly purpose by the thought that discovery would be certain to attend the[Pg 260] commission of his crime. But no such reason could prevail with a madman.
 
Flinging back his dark locks with a defiant gesture, the maniac fixed his glittering eye on me, and commenced to chant some Italian refrain composed in a very mournful key, keeping time to the air with the motions of his hand. I recognised the refrain. I had heard it once at Rivoli. It was a funeral hymn.
 
The foreign words imperfectly comprehended by me, the plaintive character of the refrain, united to the melancholy voice of the maniac, made this singing the most awful and unearthly thing I had ever heard, thrilling me to the very centre with the most eerie sensations. Every now and then he would pause to take a drink from a spirit-flask, resuming his wild song immediately afterwards. Usually a foe to intoxicants, he was now taking draughts of brandy in a reckless fashion, and I knew that he was working himself up for his fiendish task. The cold grey cell, the dim light, the gibbering thing at the table chanting my death song, formed a picture that has lived in my memory ever since, and often have I started from sleep with a cry of terror, shivering at the recollection of this night.
 
The cell had been gradually growing brighter, and at last on one side of the casement, through the tangles of ivy, appeared the silver arc of the moon whose arrowy beams slanted to the floor, adding a still greater sense of weirdness to the scene. The moon seemed to have a disturbing effect upon the artist's disordered mind, for he turned uneasily to the casement.
 
"Too much light. Too much light. I hate this silvery glare," and raising his arms he exclaimed tragically, "Oh, Endymion, why sleepest thou? Rise[Pg 261] with thy white arms and draw Cynthia down to thy embrace."
 
As he spoke the moon actually was veiled by a passing cloud.
 
"I knew he would obey me," he exclaimed triumphantly. "Am not I lord of the night and of its shadows?"
 
Had there remained in my mind any doubt as to his sanity this absurd effusion would have effectually removed it. The sound of the church clock chiming the half hour now smote on my ears. If the maniac adhered to his threat I had but thirty minutes left to live, and I concentrated all my faculties upon the difficulties of my position. My uncle must by this time have returned with Sir Hugh, and on finding myself as well as the keys of the Nuns' Tower and the gallery missing, would guess where I was and they might even now be on their way to seek me and to arrest the artist. If they were listening outside they would hear Angelo's voice and would understand the peril I was in. They could not easily force the door, nor, if they had any suspicion of the artist's insanity, would they be so rash as to try, but one blow would shatter the window and give them instant admission into the tower.
 
Buoyed up with the hope that help might arrive at any moment, I resolved, if possible, to soothe and flatter the maniac, with a view of gaining time and of getting him to postpone his self-imposed task beyond the midnight hour. I would persuade him to talk of his last picture, of his brother artists, of his early days at Rivoli—of anything, that would divert his attention from me, and delay the fatal stroke.
 
"Angelo, listen to me," I said, forcing my voice to adopt the slow deliberate tones I have heard hospital nurses employ in order that they may the more readily[Pg 262] find lodgment in the disordered brain—"I am quite willing to die."
 
Even while saying this, the incongruity of telling a falsehood when so near the point of death occurred to me, but I repeated the falsehood:
 
"I am quite willing to die."
 
"It is sweet to die for art," cried the artist gravely, as if the remark were an indisputable axiom.
 
"I will not struggle with you."
 
This at least was true, for the silken bands would not let me.
 
"Daphne wished you not to struggle," remarked the madman.
 
"But before I go, tell me—tell me—" I hesitated, not knowing what to say next. "Tell me—what has become of my brother George?" I cried, on the spur of the moment. "You must know," I added.
 
"Your brother?" cried the artist, his eyes lighting up, as if some new chord in his memory were touched. "Your brother?"
 
He was silent for a moment as if reflecting; and then looking all around, as if to ascertain that we were alone, he whispered:
 
"You will never reveal to any one what I am going to tell you?"
 
"It will not be within my power to reveal anything after you have finished with me," I replied with a smile that was the essence of ghastliness.
 
"True, true; I am forgetting that."
 
Taking up the stained poniard, he bent forward in his chair and whispered between his white teeth:
 
"You see this red stain? His! It is a twelvemonth old—a twelvemonth this very night."
 
Making a stab at an imaginary figure, he looked at[Pg 263] me, and said: "Wait. I'll show you how I did it presently."
 
"I am quite willing to wait." My trembling lips could scarcely frame the words. "Let me have the whole story—every word. I shall not mind if you take hours over it."
 
"You shall have the whole story. Oh, you shall not lose a syllable of it! Ho! ho! it was a master-stroke of craft. Was Borgia or Macchiavelli ever more cunning? I glory in the deed. I love to dwell on it. I act it every night. In the secrecy of my chamber, in the quietness of the picture-gallery, I rehearse the whole tableau of that glorious time. They would not permit me to do this in the day-time, you know," he said, exchanging his excited manner for one that was quite grave and confidential. "They would call me mad: they would take me away—far away from my studio and my easel, and they would put me in a padded room, and I should paint no more. But I am too cunning for them," he cried, his eyes lighting up once more with the fire of madness. "I baffled them. They know not that in the still hours, while they sleep, I am occupied in the work of killing Captain Willard. He takes a deal of killing, too!" he added, resuming as if by magic his quiet air again. "Each night I slay him; yet each night he returns again, clamouring for the death-stroke. I would not believe it if I did not see it for myself. Strange, is it not?" he concluded, turning to me.
 
"It's extraordinary!" my white lips gasped. Which, if it were true, it most certainly was.
 
The maniac stared at me a few seconds with a most bewildered air, looking as if he had forgotten something, or as if he did not quite understand how I came to be in my present position, and then went on:
 
[Pg 264]
 
"Yes, this red stain is his. I slew him. Why? Let me think," resting his elbow on the table and pressing his forefinger to his brow for all the world like a sane man. "Let me think; I had a motive for it. What was it? Love of my art? Yes, that was it—art."
 
He paused again, as if he found it difficult to collect his shattered memories.
 
"From the first hour of my calling as an artist it became an object with me to woo and win a woman whose face should be all that a painter could desire. No vulgar model who displays her charms for hire would do for me; my inspiration must come from a pure and beautiful maiden who, fired with the spirit of my enthusiasm, would be devoted to all that was high and noble in art for its own sake. Her lovely shape, delineated in various attitudes on the canvas, should be the making of my pictures. In short," he added, "I was a second Zeuxis in quest of beauty."
 
He made another stop, and then resumed:
 
"At last, after long years of waiting, I found what I had sought. Imagination could not picture a form more lovely than that of Daphne Leslie, and I resolved to make her the handmaid of art. But there was an obstacle in the way. That obstacle was Captain Willard. No matter. He must die; art demanded it, and I took an oath that the eve of his wedding should be the last day of his life. But how was I to set about it? I knew what suspicions would arise—what a hue and cry would be raised by society—if a distinguished officer, who had come all the way from India to wed a rich and lovely bride, should vanish mysteriously on the very eve of his intended marriage. All the machinery of the law would be set in motion to discover the author of the deed. Suspicion would be sure to fall on the artist who was known to entertain feelings of[Pg 265] love towards the bride. 'It was Vasari that did it,' men would say, 'and jealousy was the cause.' I must act with caution. Ah! I would forge a letter in Captain Willard's handwriting—easy task this for an artist!—purporting that he had fled of his own accord to the Continent. Ho! ho! it was bravely done—bravely. No one ever dreamt that he was dead, and that Angelo had killed him."
 
He put on an air of savage pride which plainly implied, "Now what do you think of that?"
 
Like a trembling child flinging a cherished eatable to a dog of which he is afraid, I flung the maniac a propitiatory falsehood, despising myself for it the minute afterwards:
 
"I always thought you were a clever fellow."
 
He accepted this tribute of admiration with the air of one who quite deserved it, and continued:
 
"Yes; I would so arrange the affair that none should ever discover what had really happened. I would kill him and travel in his dress to Dover, making it appear as if Captain Willard had really departed for the Continent. I was not unlike him in build and features, and by painting and disguising my face I could transform myself into his very image. I tried the experiment beforehand. The mirror showed me what an actor the stage has lost. Even you were deceived when landing from the steam-packet last Christmas morning. It was I whom you saw on the pier amid the falling snow."
 
My amazement at this point was so great that it made me forget the perilous situation I was in. Spellbound at the revelation, I stood like a spectator gazing at some actor who enthralls him.
 
"His death furnished me with a noble idea in connection with the picture I was then painting, 'The Fall[Pg 266] of C?sar.' Did not Parrhasius when he wished to paint Prometheus chained to the rock and tortured by the vulture, order one of his slaves to be fettered, and the bosom of the shrieking captive to be laid open, that he might paint the agony of Prometheus in all its glorious reality? Gods! what a picture that must have been! Oh, that I, too, could have by me a man just slain, with the red blood distilling from the wounds! What a glorious model it would be! Its image transferred to the canvas would be the making of my picture. What realism it would exhibit! This work at least would not be called mediocre by the cold critics. Ah! bright thought! Captain Willard shall be my model. The very stroke that deprives a rival of life shall be the means of elevating me to fame. Could vengeance take a sweeter, a more subtle form?"
 
It seemed an age since Angelo had begun his recital, but as the church-bells had not pealed the quarter, I knew he had not yet been fifteen minutes over it. My ears were keenly alert for any sound that might indicate that help was approaching, but everything was still and quiet outside the tower.
 
"I met Captain Willard late on Christmas Eve returning from Daphne's house. I asked him to come to my studio for a few minutes: 'I have a surprise for you,' I said. So I had. As I spoke I had to turn my face from him to hide the light of triumph in my eyes. He came willingly enough, talking of the happy morrow. We were alone. I led him to a picture on an easel. 'A present for your bride; do you like it?' I said, standing behind him. Oh, what a thrill was going through me! 'Yes,' he replied—his last word! 'Well, how do you like that?' I cried as my weapon descended. Hatred—love—fame nerved my arm with[Pg 267] a triple power, and I struck him down—down—down. This is how I did it."
 
At this point the maniac sprang to his feet with the rapidity of lightning, and, lifting the dagger on high, made a swift downward stab at an ideal figure. My heart gave a great leap, for I thought he was going to strike me.
 
"With one loud cry he dropped—thud! Oh, that cry! It rings in my ears still. It was the sweetest music to me. I stood over him with my dripping weapon ready to deal him a second stroke, and a red drop fell on his vest. I wanted him to cry, to move, to rise, that I might have the pleasure of striking him down once more. But he never moved............