?
It's these misshapen things that he's succeeding in producing,' said the
doctor.

'There is one more that we haven't seen,' said Arthur.

He pointed to the covering which still hid the largest of the vases. He
had a feeling that it contained the most fearful of all these monsters;
and it was not without an effort that he drew the cloth away. But no
sooner had he done this than something sprang up, so that instinctively
he started back, and it began to gibber in piercing tones. These were the
unearthly sounds that they had heard. It was not a voice, it was a kind
of raucous crying, hoarse yet shrill, uneven like the barking of a dog,
and appalling. The sounds came forth in rapid succession, angrily, as
though the being that uttered them sought to express itself in furious
words. It was mad with passion and beat against the glass walls of its
prison with clenched fists. For the hands were human hands, and the
body, though much larger, was of the shape of a new-born child. The
creature must have stood about four feet high. The head was horribly
misshapen. The skull was enormous, smooth and distended like that of a
hydrocephalic, and the forehead protruded over the face hideously. The
features were almost unformed, preternaturally small under the great,
overhanging brow; and they had an expression of fiendish malignity.

The tiny, misshapen countenance writhed with convulsive fury, and from
the mouth poured out a foaming spume. It raised its voice higher and
higher, shrieking senseless gibberish in its rage. Then it began to hurl
its whole body madly against the glass walls and to beat its head. It
appeared to have a sudden incomprehensible hatred for the three
strangers. It was trying to fly at them. The toothless gums moved
spasmodically, and it threw its face into horrible grimaces. That
nameless, loathsome abortion was the nearest that Oliver Haddo had
come to the human form.

'Come away,' said Arthur. 'We must not look at this.'

He quickly flung the covering over the jar.

'Yes, for God's sake let us go,' said Susie.

'We haven't done yet,' answered Arthur. 'We haven't found the author of
all this.'

He looked at the room in which they were, but there was no door except
that by which they had entered. Then he uttered a startled cry, and
stepping forward fell on his knee.

On the other side of the long tables heaped up with instruments, hidden
so that at first they had not seen him, Oliver Haddo lay on the