his fingers on one essential fact.

The man was going on with a slow, precise articulation as though
he would thereby make a difficult matter clear.

"The night had fallen swiftly. It was incredibly silent. There
was no sound in the Master's room, and no light except the
flicker of the logs smoldering in the fireplace. The thin line
of it appeared faintly along the sill of the door."

He paused.

"The fireplace, Excellency, is at the end of the great room,
directly opposite this door into the hall, before which I always
sat when the Master was within. The fireplace is of black marble
with an immense black-marble hearth. And the gift which I had
brought the Master stands on one side of the fire, on this marble
hearth, as though it were a single andiron."

The man turned back into the heart of his story.

"I knew by the vague sense of pressure that the devocations of
the thing were again on the way. And I began to suffer in the
spirit for the Master's safety. Interference, both by act and by
the will, were denied me. But there is an anxiety of spirit,
Excellency, that the uncertainty of an issue makes intolerable."

The man paused.

"The pressure continued - and the silence. It was nearly