The Mist in the Mirror by Susan Hill Page B

boy – no, perhaps it began at or even before his birth, and, in the end, he was obliged to go abroad and, I daresay, pursue his evil career among other devils.’
    ‘I cannot believe we are talking of the same man – Vane, the great explorer, the sensitive chronicler of places – peoples and their customs … the solitary adventurer.’
    ‘I agree. From what I have discovered, there did indeed seem to be two, very contrasting sides to the man – Jekyll and Hyde, no less.’
    I tried to make sense of what Dancer was telling me. Beyond the windows, blackbirds pecked at the frozen grass. The sky above the trees was almost silver. A beautiful morning. A perfect day.
    ‘I am grateful to you,’ I said at last. ‘I have received hints, and veiled warnings. No one has begun to speak the truth until now.’
    He smiled and began, very gently, to swivel his chair round again.
    ‘So I have deterred you,’ he said, ‘I am profoundly glad of it. Now, you will stay to enjoy lunch.’
    ‘No, Dr Dancer, you have told me things, but you havemade no difference, you have not deterred me. Why would I be deterred?’
    His face was not so much serious as sad.
    ‘You have whetted my appetite even further. My fascination is keener still.’
    He groaned.
    ‘What a subject!’ I went on. ‘What contrasts, what a host of extraordinary contradictions – what questions it raises! I scarcely know where to begin. I am unable to believe my luck. I shall in the end present the portrait, the study, of a very rare man indeed before the public.’ I was becoming carried away by what I was saying.
    ‘There is more,’ Dancer said.
    ‘Ah, yes, the warnings! Beware!’
    ‘The power of evil to do harm is very real, very strong.’
    ‘I have no doubt of it.’
    ‘Many suffered.’
    ‘Dancer, the man is dead!’
    ‘And does that mean that it has ended there?’
    ‘Oh come, man!’
    My words were brave, I heard my own voice, blustering, full of scorn. But they were hollow and I was trembling within.
    Dancer was looking at me as if he were weighing something up, deciding whether or not to speak.
    ‘Well, what is it?’
    He shook his head.
    ‘What is your own interest in Vane?’ I asked sharply.
    ‘None. I have none. Once, I read a little, out of idle curiosity. After I had heard rumours, I began to delve into such archive as the school possesses. I discovered enough to make me retreat, to retreat and close the books and turn my back. Vane was acclaimed a great man by some, after his death. Well, perhaps, in some ways, he became one. He ventured where no man had previously dared to venture, discovered much. But he was also a liar, a time-server, abully, a cheat and worse. He lived as he wished, he had his way, at the expense of others, because it pleased and amused him to do so, because it helped him to achieve his own ends, because he was corrupt and in love with power. That is how he obtained satisfaction. When he was forced to leave this country for his evil doings, he went abroad and swaggered there. He used and abused the ignorant and the innocent, though all the while he showed a face of honeyed sweetness to the world. Is this the man in whose company you would spend your hours? Your time alone? Leave him, Monmouth, let him rot.’
    He shuddered suddenly, and got up and began to pace about the room, rubbing his hands together in agitation.
    ‘You speak almost as if you had known him, as if he had done you personal harm.’
    ‘Not I.’ he said. ‘Others.’
    He faced me again. ‘Let him lie. Do not open the book.’
    ‘I am grateful to you, as I have said. I understand more now, much more. But I would ask you to trust me to read further for myself. I cannot leave it there and be so easily deterred, without proving things to myself at least.’
    ‘You are a stubborn man.’
    Yes. In this matter I seemed to have become one, to be gripped by a force outside myself, an urge to go and penetrate to the heart of the mystery, and stare