When
they were at last able to avert their eyes a fresh surprise awaited
them; the reflection of the moon in the mirror was red--not an
ordinary red--not merely a colour--but red with a lurid luminosity
that vibrated with life--with a life that all three men at once
recognized as emanating from nothing physical--from nothing good. It vanished suddenly, quite as suddenly as it had come; and the
reflection of the moon was once again only a reflection--a white,
placid sphere. For some seconds no one spoke. Hamar was the first to break the
silence. "Well!" he exclaimed, drawing a long breath; "what do you
think of that!" "Are you sure you weren't faking?" Curtis said. "I swear I wasn't," Hamar replied; "besides could any one produce a
thing like THAT? The cat didn't think it was a fake--it knew what it
was right enough. Besides, why are your teeth chattering?" "Why are yours?" Curtis retorted; "why are Matt's?" "Shall we try the second?" Hamar asked. "No!" Kelson and Curtis said in chorus. "No! We've had enough for one
night. We'll be off!" "I think I'll come with you," Hamar said, "after what has happened I
don't quite relish sleeping here alone--or rather with that cat. Hi--Satan, where are you?" Satan was not visible. It had probably hidden under the bed, but as no
one cared to look, its whereabouts remained undiscovered. With the coming of the sun, the terrors of the night wore off, and the
trio separated. Hamar would on no account accept his friends'
invitation to breakfast on the sausages and ham they had run such
risks in procuring; he made hasty tracks for a snug restaurant in
Bolter's Street, where he had a sumptuous repast for a dollar; and
then slunk home. Shortly before midnight all three met again, and at once commenced
preparations for the second test. The question arose as to who should
hold Satan. They all had vivid recollections of the cat's behaviour
the previous night; consequently no one was anxious to officiate. Finally they drew lots, and fate settled on Curtis. An exciting chase
now began. Satan, demonstrating his resentment of their treatment of
him, at every turn, knocked over a water bottle, ripped the skin of
Kelson's knuckles, and made his teeth meet in the fleshy part of
Curtis's thumb. "Hulloa! what are you up to?" Curtis savagely demanded, as Hamar
thrust a cup at him. "Hold your hand over it!" Hamar said sharply. "Don't suck it! We want
blood for this test and for the next." "I wish the brute had bitten you!" Curtis snarled; "then, perhaps, you
wouldn't be so precious keen on economics. You did right to name it
Satan! and if it doesn't attract devils nothing will. I'm not going to
touch it again. See if you can hold the beast by yourself, Matt! It
seems to be less afraid of you than of either of us." Kelson called out: "Puss! ", and the cat at once came to him. As it was now striking twelve, Hamar carefully shook three drops of
Curtis's blood from the cup on to Satan's back, while he instructed
Kelson to rub the animal's coat with the palm of the hand. Kelson
cautiously obeyed. There was a loud crackling and a shower of sparks,
of the same lurid red colour as the reflection in the mirror on the
previous night, flew out into the enveloping darkness. "That will do!" Hamar observed quietly. "Test two is satisfactorily
accomplished. We must be riper for Hell than we imagined. There is no
need for you fellows to stay any longer. I can manage the third test
alone." As soon as his colleagues had gone and he felt assured they were no
longer within hearing, Hamar took a saucer from the mantelshelf,
filled it half full of milk, and poured into it some colourless liquid
out of a tiny phial labelled poison. "Here pussy," he called out, softly. "Pretty pussy, come and have your
supper! Pussy!" And Satan, unable to resist the tempting sight of the milk, crept out
of his hiding-place and quite unsuspiciously dipped his tongue into
the saucer and lapped. Hamar, in the meanwhile went to a box at the
foot of the bed and produced a sack. Then he slipped on his boots and
coat, and opening the door of a cupboard near the head of the bed
fetched out a small spade. He was now ready; and--so was pussy. "That paves the way for test six," Hamar observed; "no one can say I
am a waster--I make use of everything--and every one;" and so saying
he tumbled the cat into the sack and hurried out. Some half-hour later he had returned to his room, and was busily
engaged making preparations for test three. Letting a drop of Curtis's
blood fall on the skull, he put the latter under his pillow, and
retired to rest. He had slept for little over an hour, when he awoke
with a start. The muffled sound of hammering--as of nails in a
coffin--was going on all around him, and occasionally it seemed to him
that something big and heavy stalked across the floor; but in spite of
the fact that the room was illuminated with a red glow--the same lurid
red as had appeared in tests one and two--nothing was to be seen. The
phenomena lasted five or six minutes and then everything was again
normal. Hamar was so terrified that he lay with his head under the
bedclothes till morning, and vowed nothing on earth would persuade him
to sleep in that room again. But sunlight soon restored his courage,
and by the evening he was quite eager to go on with the next test. He
had some difficulty in persuading any one to allow him the use of an
oven for so pernicious a mixture as nightshade and hemlock; but at
last he over-ruled the objections of some good-natured woman--the
mother of one of the office boys at his former employer's--and test
four proved as successful as the previous three. The preliminary part
of test five was also successfully accomplished; but in carrying out
the second part of it, Hamar all but met with disaster. He was walking
along Kearney Street with the specially prepared hazel twig carefully
concealed beneath his coat, when just opposite Saddler's jewelry
store, he came across a child standing by itself. The nearest person
being some fifty yards away, and no policeman within sight, Hamar
concluded this was too good an opportunity to be lost. He whipped out
the twig, and held it, in the manner prescribed, in front of the
child. The effect was instantaneous. The child turned white as death,
its eyes bulged with terror, and opening its mouth to its full extent
it commenced to shriek and yell. Then it fell on the pavement; and
clutching and clawing the air, and foaming at the mouth rolled over
and over. People from every quarter flocked to the spot, and judging
Hamar, from his proximity to the child, to be responsible for its
condition, shouted for the police. The latter, however, arrived too
late. Hamar, whose presence of mind had only left him for the moment
seeing a bicycle leaning against a store door, jumped on it and soon
put a respectable distance between himself and the crowd. That night the trio met once more in Hamar's room for test six.