Sometimes, as he sat pondering over the whole affair, he smiled, half
sadly, half sarcastically. For the event brought home to his ready
modesty the sublime ignorance of all clever and instructed men, taught
him to wonder, as he had often wondered, that there exists in such a
world as ours such a fantastic growth as the flourishing weed, conceit.
Another matter that puzzled him greatly was this: As the days went on,
and as Valentine grew--and he did grow--more certain of his own power for
evil over Julian, and as, consequently, he took less and less pains to
hide the truth of his personality from the knowledge of the doctor, the
latter was frequently seized with the appalled sensation which had long
ago overtaken him when he was followed in Regent Street and in Vere
Street. This recurrence of sensation, and the certainty forced gradually
upon the doctor that it was caused by the presence of Valentine,
naturally led him to wonder whether it were possible that the man who
had dogged his steps, and eventually fled from him, could have been
Valentine himself. If that were indeed so, then this madness--if it did
exist--must surely have come upon Valentine before the trance. Nothing
but a madness could have led him thus in the night hours to steal out
in pursuit of the friend who had just left his house and company.
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