There came the great blare of the flashlight, and
a simultaneous roar of barking from the two dogs. "The intensity of the flash made all the place seem dark for some
moments, and in that time of darkness, I heard a jingle in the direction
of the door, and strained to look. The effect of the bright light passed,
and I could see clearly again. The great entrance door was being slowly
closed. It shut with a sharp snick, and there followed a long silence,
broken only by the whimpering of the dogs. "I turned suddenly, and looked at Wentworth. He was looking at me. "'Just as it did before,' he whispered. "'Most extraordinary,' I said, and he nodded and looked 'round,
nervously. "The policemen were pretty quiet, and I judged that they were feeling
rather worse than Wentworth; though, for that matter, you must not think
that I was altogether natural; yet I have seen so much that is
extraordinary, that I daresay I can keep my nerves steady longer than
most people. "I looked over my shoulder at the men, and cautioned them, in a low
voice, not to move outside of the Barriers, _whatever happened_; not even
though the house should seem to be rocking and about to tumble on to
them; for well I knew what some of the great Forces are capable of doing. Yet, unless it should prove to be one of the cases of the more terrible
Saiitii Manifestation, we were almost certain of safety, so long as we
kept to our order within the Pentacle. "Perhaps an hour and a half passed, quietly, except when, once in a way,
the dogs would whine distressfully. Presently, however, they ceased even
from this, and I could see them lying on the floor with their paws over
their noses, in a most peculiar fashion, and shivering visibly. The
sight made me feel more serious, as you can understand. "Suddenly, the candle in the corner furthest from the main door, went
out. An instant later, Wentworth jerked my arm, and I saw that the candle
before one of the sealed doors had been put out. I held my camera ready. Then, one after another, every candle about the hall was put out, and
with such speed and irregularity, that I could never catch one in the
actual act of being extinguished. Yet, for all that, I took a flashlight
of the hall in general. "There was a time in which I sat half-blinded by the great glare of the
flash, and I blamed myself for not having remembered to bring a pair of
smoked goggles, which I have sometimes used at these times. I had felt
the men jump, at the sudden light, and I called out loud to them to sit
quiet, and to keep their feet exactly to their proper places. My voice,
as you can imagine, sounded rather horrid and frightening in the great
room, and altogether it was a beastly moment. "Then, I was able to see again, and I stared here and there about the
hall; but there was nothing showing unusual; only, of course, it was dark
now over in the corners. "Suddenly, I saw that the great fire was blackening. It was going out
visibly, as I looked. If I said that some monstrous, invisible,
impossible creature sucked the life from it, I could best explain the
way the light and flame went out of it. It was most extraordinary to
watch. In the time that I watched it, every vestige of fire was gone
from it, and there was no light outside of the ring of candles around
the Pentacle. "The deliberateness of the thing troubled me more than I can make clear
to you. It conveyed to me such a sense of a calm Deliberate Force present
in the hall: The steadfast intention to 'make a darkness' was horrible. The _extent_ of the Power to affect the Material was horrible. The
extent of the Power to affect the Material was now the one constant,
anxious questioning in my brain. You can understand? "Behind me, I heard the policemen moving again, and I knew that they were
getting thoroughly frightened. I turned half 'round, and told them,
quietly but plainly, that they were safe only so long as they stayed
within the Pentacle, in the position in which I had put them. If they
once broke, and went outside of the Barrier, no knowledge of mine could
state the full extent of the dreadfulness of the danger. "I steadied them up, by this quiet, straight reminder; but if they had
known, as I knew, that there is no certainty in any 'Protection,' they
would have suffered a great deal more, and probably have broken the
'Defense,' and made a mad, foolish run for an impossible safety. "Another hour passed, after this, in an absolute quietness. I had a sense
of awful strain and oppression, as though I were a little spirit in the
company of some invisible, brooding monster of the unseen world, who, as
yet, was scarcely conscious of us. I leant across to Wentworth, and asked
him in a whisper whether he had a feeling as if something were in the
room. He looked very pale, and his eyes kept always on the move. He
glanced just once at me, and nodded; then stared away 'round the hall
again. And when I came to think, I was doing the same thing. "Abruptly, as though a hundred unseen hands had snuffed them, every
candle in the Barrier went dead out, and we were left in a darkness that
seemed, for a little, absolute; for the light from the Pentacle was too
weak and pale to penetrate far across the great hall. "I tell you, for a moment, I just sat there as though I had been frozen
solid. I felt the 'creep' go all over me, and seem to stop in my brain. I
felt all at once to be given a power of hearing that was far beyond the
normal. I could hear my own heart thudding most extraordinarily loud. I
began, however, to feel better, after a while; but I simply had not the
pluck to move. You can understand? "Presently, I began to get my courage back. I gripped at my camera and
flashlight, and waited. My hands were simply soaked with sweat. I glanced
once at Wentworth. I could see him only dimly. His shoulders were hunched
a little, his head forward; but though it was motionless, I knew that his
eyes were not. It is queer how one knows that sort of thing at times. The
police were just as silent. And thus a while passed. "A sudden sound broke across the silence. From two sides of the room
there came faint noises. I recognized them at once, as the breaking of
the sealing-wax. _The sealed doors were opening._ I raised the camera and
flashlight, and it was a peculiar mixture of fear and courage that helped
me to press the button. As the great flare of light lit up the hall I
felt the men all about me jump. The darkness fell like a clap of thunder,
if you can understand, and seemed tenfold. Yet, in the moment of
brightness, I had seen that all the sealed doors were wide open. "Suddenly, all around us, there sounded a drip, drip, drip, upon the
floor of the great hall. I thrilled with a queer, realizing emotion, and
a sense of a very real and present danger--_imminent._ The 'blood-drip'
had commenced. And the grim question was now whether the Barriers could
save us from whatever had come into the huge room.