Dr.
Porhoet told her where to stand. Arthur took his place in front of her.

'You must not move till I give you leave. If you go outside the figure I
have drawn, I cannot protect you.'

For a moment Dr Porhoet stood in perfect silence. Then he began to recite
strange words in Latin. Susie heard him but vaguely. She did not know the
sense, and his voice was so low that she could not have distinguished the
words. But his intonation had lost that gentle irony which was habitual
to him, and he spoke with a trembling gravity that was extraordinarily
impressive. Arthur stood immobile as a rock. The flames died away, and
they saw one another only by the glow of the ashes, dimly, like persons
in a vision of death. There was silence. Then the necromancer spoke
again, and now his voice was louder. He seemed to utter weird
invocations, but they were in a tongue that the others knew not. And
while he spoke the light from the burning cinders on a sudden went out.

It did not die, but was sharply extinguished, as though by invisible
hands. And now the darkness was more sombre than that of the blackest
night. The trees that surrounded them were hidden from their eyes, and
the whiteness of the stone bench was seen no longer. They stood but a
little way one from the other, but each might have stood alone. Susie
strained her eyes, but she could see nothing. She looked up quickly;
the stars were gone out, and she could see no further over her head than
round about. The darkness was terrifying. And from it, Dr Porhoet's voice
had a ghastly effect. It seemed to come, wonderfully changed, from the
void of bottomless chaos. Susie clenched her hands so that she might not
faint.

All at once she started, for the old man's voice was cut by a sudden gust
of wind. A moment before, the utter silence had been almost intolerable,
and now a storm seemed to have fallen upon them. The trees all around
them rocked in the wind; they heard the branches creak; and they heard
the hissing of the leaves. They were in the midst of a hurricane. And
they felt the earth sway as it resisted the straining roots of great
trees, which seemed to be dragged up by the force of the furious gale.
Whistling and roaring, the wind stormed all about them, and the doctor,
raising his voice, tried in vain to command it. But the strangest thing
of all was that, where they stood, there was no sign of the raging blast.
The air immediately about them was as still as it had been