In the hope of later solving the cryptogram, Blake bore off this
volume in his coat pocket. Many of the great tomes on the shelves
fascinated him unutterably, and he felt tempted to borrow them at some
later time. He wondered how they could have remained undisturbed so
long. Was he the first to conquer the clutching, pervasive fear which
had for nearly sixty years protected this deserted place from visitors? Having now thoroughly explored the ground floor, Blake plowed again
through the dust of the spectral nave to the front vestibule, where he
had seen a door and staircase presumably leading up to the blackened
tower and steeple--objects so long familiar to him at a distance. The
ascent was a choking experience, for dust lay thick, while the spiders
had done their worst in this constricted place. The staircase was a
spiral with high, narrow wooden treads, and now and then Blake passed a
clouded window looking dizzily out over the city. Though he had seen no
ropes below, he expected to find a bell or peal of bells in the tower
whose narrow, louver-boarded lancet windows his field-glass had studied
so often. Here he was doomed to disappointment, for when he attained
the top of the stairs he found the tower chamber vacant of chimes, and
clearly devoted to vastly different purposes. *       *       *       *       *

The room, about fifteen feet square, was faintly lighted by four lancet
windows, one on each side, which were glazed within their screening of
decayed louver-boards. These had been further fitted with tight, opaque
screens, but the latter were now largely rotted away. In the center of
the dust-laden floor rose a curiously angled stone pillar some four
feet in height and two in average diameter, covered on each side with
bizarre, crudely incised and wholly unrecognizable hieroglyphs. On
this pillar rested a metal box of peculiarly asymmetrical form; its
hinged lid thrown back, and its interior holding what looked beneath
the decade-deep dust to be an egg-shaped or irregularly spherical
object some four inches through. Around the pillar in a rough circle
were seven high-backed Gothic chairs still largely intact, while behind
them, ranging along the dark-paneled walls, were seven colossal images
of crumbling, black-painted plaster, resembling more than anything else
the cryptic carven megaliths of mysterious Easter Island. In one corner
of the cobwebbed chamber a ladder was built into the wall, leading up
to the closed trap-door of the windowless steeple above. As Blake grew accustomed to the feeble light he noticed odd bas-reliefs
on the strange open box of yellowish metal. Approaching, he tried to
clear the dust away with his hands and handkerchief, and saw that
the figurings were of a monstrous and utterly alien kind; depicting
entities which, though seemingly alive, resembled no known life-form
ever evolved on this planet. The four-inch seeming sphere turned out
to be a nearly black, red-striated polyhedron with many irregular
flat surfaces; either a very remarkable crystal of some sort, or an
artificial object of carved and highly polished mineral matter. It did
not touch the bottom of the box, but was held suspended by means of
a metal band around its center, with seven queerly-designed supports
extending horizontally to angles of the box's inner wall near the
top. This stone, once exposed, exerted upon Blake an almost alarming
fascination. He could scarcely tear his eyes from it, and as he looked
at its glistening surfaces he almost fancied it was transparent, with
half-formed worlds of wonder within. Into his mind floated pictures of
alien orbs with great stone towers, and other orbs with titan mountains
and no mark of life, and still remoter spaces where only a stirring in
vague blacknesses told of the presence of consciousness and will. When he did look away, it was to notice a somewhat singular mound of
dust in the far corner near the ladder to the steeple. Just why it took
his attention he could not tell, but something in its contours carried
a message to his unconscious mind. Plowing toward it, and brushing
aside the hanging cobwebs as he went, he began to discern something
grim about it. Hand and handkerchief soon revealed the truth, and Blake
gasped with a baffling mixture of emotions. It was a human skeleton,
and it must have been there for a very long time. The clothing was in
shreds, but some buttons and fragments of cloth bespoke a man's gray
suit. There were other bits of evidence--shoes, metal clasps, huge
buttons for round cuffs, a stickpin of bygone pattern, a reporter's
badge with the name of the old _Providence Telegram_, and a crumbling
leather pocket-book. Blake examined the latter with care, finding
within it several bills of antiquated issue, a celluloid advertising
calendar for 1893, some cards with the name "Edwin M. Lillibridge," and
a paper covered with penciled memoranda. This paper held much of a puzzling nature, and Blake read it carefully
at the dim westward window. Its disjointed text included such phrases
as the following:

    "Prof. Enoch Bowen home from Egypt May 1844--buys old Free-Will
    Church in July--his archæological work & studies in occult well
    known." "Dr. Drowne of 4th Baptist warns against Starry Wisdom in sermon
    Dec. 29, 1844." "Congregation 97 by end of '45." "1846--3 disappearances--first mention of Shining Trapezohedron." "7 disappearances 1848--stories of blood sacrifice begin." "Investigation 1853 comes to nothing--stories of sounds." "Fr. O'Malley tells of devil-worship with box found in great
    Egyptian ruins--says they call up something that can't exist in
    light. Flees a little light, and banished by strong light. Then has
    to be summoned again. Probably got this from deathbed confession
    of Francis X. Feeney, who had joined Starry Wisdom in '49. These
    people say the Shining Trapezohedron shows them heaven & other
    worlds, & that the Haunter of the Dark tells them secrets in some
    way." "Story of Orrin B. Eddy 1857. They call it up by gazing at the
    crystal, & have a secret language of their own." "200 or more in cong. 1863, exclusive of men at front." "Irish boys mob church in 1869 after Patrick Regan's disappearance." "Veiled article in J. March 14, '72, but people don't talk about
    it." "6 disappearances 1876--secret committee calls on Mayor Doyle." "Action promised Feb. 1877--church closes in April." "Gang--Federal Hill Boys--threaten Dr. ---- and vestrymen in May." "181 persons leave city before end of '77--mention no names." "Ghost stories begin around 1880--try to ascertain truth of report
    that no human being has entered church since 1877." "Ask Lanigan for photograph of place taken 1851...."

       *       *       *       *       *

Restoring the paper to the pocket-book and placing the latter in
his coat, Blake turned to look down at the skeleton in the dust.