The calm spirit of the fresh October day resumed
command. Side by side we advanced and examined the place. The grass was
smouldering, the ground still hot. The circle of burned earth was a
foot to a foot and a half in diameter. It looked like an ordinary
picnic fireplace. I bent down cautiously to look, but in a second I
sprang back with an involuntary cry of alarm, for, as the doctor
stamped on the ashes to prevent them spreading, a sound of hissing rose
from the spot as though he had kicked a living creature. This hissing
was faintly audible in the air. It moved past us, away towards the
thicker portion of the wood in the direction of our field, and in a
second Dr. Silence had left the fire and started in pursuit. And then began the most extraordinary hunt of invisibility I can ever
conceive. He went fast even at the beginning, and, of course, it was perfectly
obvious that he was following something. To judge by the poise of his
head he kept his eyes steadily at a certain level—just above the height
of a man—and the consequence was he stumbled a good deal over the
roughness of the ground. The hissing sound had stopped. There was no
sound of any kind, and what he saw to follow was utterly beyond me. I
only know, that in mortal dread of being left behind, and with a biting
curiosity to see whatever there was to be seen, I followed as quickly
as I could, and even then barely succeeded in keeping up with him. And, as we went, the whole mad jumble of the Colonel’s stories ran
through my brain, touching a sense of frightened laughter that was only
held in check by the sight of this earnest, hurrying figure before me. For John Silence at work inspired me with a kind of awe. He looked so
diminutive among these giant twisted trees, while yet I knew that his
purpose and his knowledge were so great, and even in hurry he was
dignified. The fancy that we were playing some queer, exaggerated game
together met the fact that we were two men dancing upon the brink of
some possible tragedy, and the mingling of the two emotions in my mind
was both grotesque and terrifying. He never turned in his mad chase, but pushed rapidly on, while I panted
after him like a figure in some unreasoning nightmare. And, as I ran,
it came upon me that he had been aware all the time, in his quiet,
internal way, of many things that he had kept for his own secret
consideration; he had been watching, waiting, planning from the very
moment we entered the shade of the wood. By some inner, concentrated
process of mind, dynamic if not actually magical, he had been in direct
contact with the source of the whole adventure, the very essence of the
real mystery. And now the forces were moving to a climax. Something was
about to happen, something important, something possibly dreadful. Every nerve, every sense, every significant gesture of the plunging
figure before me proclaimed the fact just as surely as the skies, the
winds, and the face of the earth tell the birds the time to migrate and
warn the animals that danger lurks and they must move. In a few moments we reached the foot of the mound and entered the
tangled undergrowth that lay between us and the sunlight of the field. Here the difficulties of fast travelling increased a hundredfold. There
were brambles to dodge, low boughs to dive under, and countless tree
trunks closing up to make a direct path impossible. Yet Dr. Silence
never seemed to falter or hesitate. He went, diving, jumping, dodging,
ducking, but ever in the same main direction, following a clean trail. Twice I tripped and fell, and both times, when I picked myself up
again, I saw him ahead of me, still forcing a way like a dog after its
quarry. And sometimes, like a dog, he stopped and pointed—human
pointing it was, psychic pointing, and each time he stopped to point I
heard that faint high hissing in the air beyond us. The instinct of an
infallible dowser possessed him, and he made no mistakes. At length, abruptly, I caught up with him, and found that we stood at
the edge of the shallow pond Colonel Wragge had mentioned in his
account the night before. It was long and narrow, filled with dark
brown water, in which the trees were dimly reflected. Not a ripple
stirred its surface. “Watch!” he cried out, as I came up. “It’s going to cross. It’s bound
to betray itself. The water is its natural enemy, and we shall see the
direction.”

And, even as he spoke, a thin line like the track of a water-spider,
shot swiftly across the shiny surface; there was a ghost of steam in
the air above; and immediately I became aware of an odour of burning. Dr. Silence turned and shot a glance at me that made me think of
lightning. I began to shake all over. “Quick!” he cried with excitement, “to the trail again! We must run
around. It’s going to the house!”

The alarm in his voice quite terrified me. Without a false step I
dashed round the slippery banks and dived again at his heels into the
sea of bushes and tree trunks. We were now in the thick of the very
dense belt that ran around the outer edge of the plantation, and the
field was near; yet so dark was the tangle that it was some time before
the first shafts of white sunlight became visible. The doctor now ran
in zigzags. He was following something that dodged and doubled quite
wonderfully, yet had begun, I fancied, to move more slowly than before. “Quick!” he cried. “In the light we shall lose it!”

I still saw nothing, heard nothing, caught no suggestion of a trail;
yet this man, guided by some interior divining that seemed infallible,
made no false turns, though how he failed to crash headlong into the
trees has remained a mystery to me ever since. And then, with a sudden
rush, we found ourselves on the skirts of the wood with the open field
lying in bright sunshine before our eyes. “Too late!” I heard him cry, a note of anguish in his voice. “It’s
out—and, by God, it’s making for the house!”

I saw the Colonel standing in the field with his dogs where we had left
him. He was bending double, peering into the wood where he heard us
running, and he straightened up like a bent whip released. John Silence
dashed passed, calling him to follow. “We shall lose the trail in the light,” I heard him cry as he ran. “But
quick! We may yet get there in time!”

That wild rush across the open field, with the dogs at our heels,
leaping and barking, and the elderly Colonel behind us running as
though for his life, shall I ever forget it? Though I had only vague
ideas of the meaning of it all, I put my best foot forward, and, being
the youngest of the three, I reached the house an easy first. I drew
up, panting, and turned to wait for the others. But, as I turned,
something moving a little distance away caught my eye, and in that
moment I swear I experienced the most overwhelming and singular shock
of surprise and terror I have ever known, or can conceive as possible.