of some wonder-working philtre. It is all very well for Berta's father to see in him a masterful mind and an eccentric nature. And who knows—he has sometimes heard of mysterious fluids, of subtle forces which attract and repel, of dominating influences, of marvels of magnetism; and although he has never given a great deal of thought to any of those matters, he thinks about them since he has felt himself dominated by this singular personage, and Adrian Baker has become, in fact, his fixed idea, his absorbing thought, his unceasing preoccupation, his constant monomania. Berta's father and the housekeeper may very well attribute to him marvellous powers, suggested by their own excited imaginations; but we must not share in those hallucinations, nor are we to conclude from them that Adrian Baker is outside the common law to which ordinary mortals are subject.
This is evident; but, still, who is Adrian Baker?
We shall present here all the information that we have been able to gather about him, and let each one draw from it the conclusion he pleases.
It is not yet quite two years since one of the carriages which transport passengers from the railway station to the city which is the scene of our story, drove rapidly from the station; the energy with which the coachman whipped up his
