This was not unusual, and it did not alarm him.

Quite often of late these hot and feverish spells had come upon him, nearly always at night.

Usually they were followed the next day by a terrific headache.

More and more frequently they had been warning him how nearly down and out he was, and he knew what to expect.
He put out his light and stretched himself between the warm blankets of his bed, knowing that he was about to begin again the fight he dreaded--the struggle that always came at night with the demon that lived within him, the demon that was feeding on his life as a leech feeds on blood, the demon that was killing him inch by inch.

Nerves altogether unstrung! Nerves frayed and broken until they were bleeding! Worry--emptiness of heart and soul--a world turned black! And all because of _her_--the golden goddess who had laughed at him in her room, whose laughter would never die out of his ears.