darkness in little uncertain gusts. He heard the breathings pause, then
recommence again in quicker and louder succession. Henry, stirred
simply, perhaps, by the terror of his anticipation, moved back into the
darker shadows in the nook of the cabinet, and stayed there with his
shirt pressed against his little trembling knees.

Then followed, after a long time, a half yellow circle of light that
touched the top steps of the stairs and a square of the wall; behind the
light was the stealthy figure of Mrs. Carter. She stood there for a
moment, one hand with a candle raised, the other pressed against her
breast; from one finger of this hand a bunch of heavy keys dangled. She
stood there, with her wide, staring eyes, like glass in the
candle-light, staring about her, her red cheeks rising and falling with
her agitation, her body seeming enormous, her shadow on the wall huge in
the flickering light. At the sight of his enemy Henry's terror was so
frantic that his hands beat with little spasmodic movements against the
wall.

He did not _see_ Mrs. Carter at all, but he saw rather the movement
through the air and darkness of the house of something that would bring
down upon him the full naked force of the Terror that he had all his
life anticipated. He had always known that the awful hour would arrive
when the Terror would grip him; again and again he had seen its eyes,
felt its breath, heard its movements, and these movements had been
forewarnings of some future day. That day had arrived.

There was only one thing that he could do; his Friend alone in all the
world could help him. With his soul dizzy and faint from fear, he prayed
for his Friend; had he been less frightened he would have screamed aloud
for him to come and help him.