Since we had left Naples I had purposely avoided exciting him by talking on the useless and shocking subject of the apparition by which he believed himself to be perpetually followed.

Just now, however, he seemed so calm and collected--so little likely to be violently agitated by any allusion to the dangerous topic, that I ventured to speak out boldly.
"Does the phantom still appear to you," I asked, "as it appeared at Naples ?" He looked at me and smiled.
"Did I not tell you that it followed me everywhere ?" His eyes wandered back again to the vacant space, and he went on speaking in that direction as if he had been continuing the conversation with some third person in the room.

"We shall part," he said, slowly and softly, "when the empty place is filled in Wincot vault.

Then I shall stand with Ada before the altar in the Abbey chapel, and when my eyes meet hers they will see the tortured face no more." Saying this, he leaned his head on his hand, sighed, and began repeating softly to himself the lines of the old prophecy: When in Wincot vault a place Waits for one of Monkton's race-- When that one forlorn shall lie Graveless under open sky, Beggared of six feet of earth, Though lord of acres from his birth-- That shall be a certain sign Of the end of Monktons line.
Dwindling ever faster, faster, Dwindling to the last-left master; From mortal ken, from light of day, Monkton's race shall pass away." Fancying that he pronounced the last lines a little incoherently, I tried to make him change the subject.

He took no notice of what I said, and went on talking to himself.
"Monkton's race shall pass away," he repeated, "but not with _me_.