w them why this misery came upon them.

Then they went to bed; and Henry asked that he might lie in the priest's
room, which he willingly granted. And so the house was dark, and they
made as though they would sleep; but the Father could not sleep, and he
heard Henry weeping silently to himself like a little child.

But at last the Father slept--how long he knew not--and suddenly brake
out of his sleep with a horror of darkness all about him, and knew that
there was some evil thing abroad. So he looked upon the room. He heard
Henry mutter heavily in his sleep as though there was a dark terror upon
him; and then, in the light of the dying embers, the Father saw a thing
rise upon the hearth, as though it had slept there, and woke to stretch
itself. And then in the half-light it seemed softly to gambol and play;
but whereas when an innocent beast does this in the simple joy of its
heart, and seems a fond and pretty sight, the Father thought he had
never seen so ugly a sight as the beast gambolling all by itself, as if
it could not contain its own dreadful joy; it looked viler and more
wicked every moment; then, too, there spread in the room the sharp scent
of the sea, with the foul smell underneath it, that gave the Father a
deadly sickness; he tried to pray, but no words would come, and he felt
indeed that the evil was too strong for him. Presently the beast
desisted from its play, and looking wickedly about it, came near to the
Father's bed, and seemed to put up its hairy forelegs upon it; he could
see its narrow and obscene eyes, which burned with a dull yellow light,
and were fixed upon him. And now the Father thought that his end was
near, for he could stir neither hand nor foot, and the sweat rained down
his brow; but he made a mighty effort, and in a voice which shocked
himself, so dry and husky and withal of so loud and screaming a tone it
was, he said three holy words. The beast gave a great quiver of rage,
but it dropped down on the floor, and in a moment was gone. Then Henry
woke, and raising himself on his arm, said somewhat; but there broke out
in the house a great outcry and the stamping of feet, which seemed very
fearful in the silence of the night. The priest leapt out of his bed all
dizzy, and made a light, and ran to the door, and went out, crying
whatever words came to his head. The door of Master Grimston's room was
open, and a strange and strangling sound came forth; the Father made his
way in, and foun