The Eye of Istar

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Chapter One. The Mystery Man. “Hush! Think, if you were overheard!” “Well, my dear fellow, I only assert what’s true,” I said. “I really can’t believe it,” observed my companion, shaking his head doubtfully. “But I’m absolutely satisfied,” I answered. “The two affairs, mysterious as they are, are more closely connected than we imagine. I thought I had convinced you by my arguments. A revelation will be made some day, and it will be a startling one—depend upon it.” “You’ll never convince me without absolute proof—never. The idea is far too hazy to be possible. Only a madman could dream such a thing.” “Then I suppose I’m a madman?” I laughed. “No, old chap. I don’t mean any insult, of course,” my friend the journalist, a youngish, dark-haired man, hastened to assure me. “But the whole thing is really too extraordinary to believe.” We were seated together one June morning some years ago, in a train on the Underground Railway, and had been discussing a very remarkable occurrence which had been discovered a few days before—a discovery that was a secret between us. Scarcely, however, had he uttered his final denunciation of my theory when the train ran into the sulphurous ever-murky station of Blackfriars, for the electrification of the line was not then completed: and promising to continue our argument later, he bade me good-bye, sprang out, and hastened away in the crowd of silk-hatted City men on their way to their offices. He was rather tall, aged about thirty, with a well-cut, clever face, a complexion unusually dark, a well-trimmed black moustache, and a smart gait which gave him something of a military bearing. Yet his cravat was habitually tied with carelessness, and he usually wore a light overcoat except through the month of August.