temporary, and I will
see that no harm comes to him."

He glanced round at the arrangements with approval.

"Red light," he said, indicating the shaded lamps, "has the lowest rate
of vibration. Materialisations are dissipated by strong light--won't
form, or hold together--in rapid vibrations."

I was not sure that I approved altogether of this dim light, for in
complete darkness there is something protective--the knowledge that one
cannot be seen, probably--which a half-light destroys, but I remembered
the warning to keep my thoughts steady, and forbore to give them
expression.

There was a step outside, and the figure of Colonel Wragge stood in the
doorway. Though entering on tiptoe, he made considerable noise and
clatter, for his free movements were impeded by the burden he carried,
and we saw a large yellowish bowl held out at arms' length from his
body, the mouth covered with a white cloth. His face, I noted, was
rigidly composed. He, too, was master of himself. And, as I thought of
this old soldier moving through the long series of alarms, worn with
watching and wearied with assault, unenlightened yet undismayed, even
down to the dreadful shock of his sister's terror, and still showing the
dogged pluck that persists in the face of defeat, I understood what Dr.
Silence meant when he described him as a man "to be counted on."

I think there was nothing beyond this rigidity of his stern features,
and a certain greyness of the complexion, to betray the turmoil of the
emotions that were doubtless going on within; and the quality of these
two men, each in his own way, so keyed me up that, by the time the door
was shut and we had exchanged silent greetings, all the latent courage I
possessed was well to the fore, and I felt as sure of myself as I knew I
ever could feel.

Colonel Wragge set the bowl carefully in the centre of the table.

"Midnight," he said shortly, glancing at his watch, and we all three
moved to our chairs.

There, in the middle of that cold and silent place, we sat, with the
vile bowl before us, and a thin, hardly perceptible steam rising through
the damp air from the surface of the white cloth and disappearing
upwards the moment it passed beyond the zone of red light and entered
the deep shadows thrown forward by the projecting wall of chimney.

The doctor had indicated our respective places, and I found myself
seated with my back to the door and opposite the black hearth. The
Colonel was on