n the end came those mighty doors
would actually open. And the thought woke a kind of elemental terror in
him that was not of this world--yet marvelously attractive.

III

That night the singular rushing sound again disturbed him. It seemed as
before to pass through the entire building, but this time it included a
greater space in its operations, for he fancied he could hear it outside
the house as well, traveling far up into the recesses of the dark
mountains. Like the sweep of immense draughts of air it went down the
passage and rolled on into the sky, making him think of the clergyman's
suggestion that some sounds might require airwaves of a hundred miles
instead of a few inches, too vast to be heard as sound. And shortly after
it followed the great gliding stride of Mr. Skale himself down the
corridor. That, at least, was unmistakable.

During the following day, moreover, Mr. Skale remained invisible.
Spinrobin, of course, had never permitted himself to search the house, or
even to examine the other rooms in his own corridor. The quarters where
Miriam slept were equally unknown to him. But he was quite certain that
these prolonged periods of absence were spent by the clergyman in some
remote part of the rambling building where there existed isolated, if not
actually secret, rooms in which he practiced the rituals of some
dangerous and intrepid worship. And these intimidating and mysterious
sounds at night were, of course, something to do with the forces he
conjured....

The day was still and windless, the house silent as the grave. He walked
about the hills during the afternoon, practicing his Hebrew "Names" and
"Words" like a schoolboy learning a lesson. And all about him the slopes
of mountain watched him, listening. So did the sheet of snow, shining in
the wintry sunlight. The clergyman seemed to have put all sound in his
pocket and taken it away with him. The absence of anything approaching
noise became almost oppressive. It was a Silence that prepares. Spinrobin
went about on tiptoe, spoke to Miriam in whispers, practiced his Names in
hushed, expectant tones. He almost expected to see the moors and
mountains open their deep sides and let the Sounds of which they were the
visible shape escape awfully about him....

In these hours of solitude, all that Skale had told him, and more still
that he divined himself, haunted him with a sense of disquieting reality.
Inaudible sounds of fearful volume, invisible f