and his eyes hanging heavily in their sockets. He saw vague
reference to "Enoch," and saw the terrible drawings by an ancient
Dominican of Rome....

Paragraph after paragraph he read: the horror-striking testimony of
Nider's _Ant-Hill_, the testimony of people who died shrieking at the
stake; the recitals of grave-tenders, of jurists and hang-men. Then
unexpectedly, among all of this monumental vestige, there appeared
before his eyes the name of--_Autiel Duryea_; and he stopped reading as
though invisibly struck.

* * * * *

Thunder clapped near the lodge and rattled the window-panes. The deep
rolling of bursting clouds echoed over the valley. But he heard none of
it. His eyes were on those two short sentences which his
father--someone--had underlined with dark red crayon.

... The execution, four years ago, of Autiel Duryea does not
end the Duryea controversy. Time alone can decide whether the
Demon has claimed that family from its beginning to its end....

Arthur read on about the trial of Autiel Duryea before Veniti, the
Carcassonnean Inquisitor-General; read, with mounting horror, the
evidence which had sent that far-gone Duryea to the pillar--the evidence
of a bloodless corpse who had been Autiel Duryea's young brother.

Unmindful now of the tremendous storm which had centered over Timber
Lake, unheeding the clatter of windows and the swish of pines on the
roof--even of his father who worked down at the lake's edge in a
drenching rain--Arthur fastened his glance to the blurred print of those
pages, sinking deeper and deeper into the garbled legends of a dark
age....

On the last page of the chapter he again saw the name of his ancestor,
Autiel Duryea. He traced a shaking finger over the narrow lines of
words, and when he finished reading them he rolled sideways on the bed,
and from his lips came a sobbing, mumbling prayer.

"God, oh God in Heaven protect me...."

For he had read:

As in the case of Autiel Duryea we observe that this specimen
of _vrykolakas_ preys only upon the blood in its own family. It
possesses none of the characteristics of the undead vampire,
being usually a living male person of otherwise normal
appearances, unsuspecting its inherent demonism.

But this _vrykolakas_ cannot act according to its demoniacal
possession unless it is in the presence of a second member of
the same family, who acts as