hey rolled
apart. A leaden tide of apathy crept over Woolfolk's battered body,
folded his aching brain. He listened in a sort of indifferent
attention to the tempestuous breathing of Iscah Nicholas. John
Woolfolk wondered dully where Millie was. There had been no sign of
her since he had fallen down the step and she had cried out. Perhaps
she was dead from fright. He considered this possibility in a hazy,
detached manner. She would be better dead--if he failed.

He heard, with little interest, a stirring on the floor beside him,
and thought with an overwhelming weariness and distaste that the
strife was to commence once more. But, curiously, Nicholas moved away
from him. Woolfolk was glad; and then he was puzzled for a moment by
the sliding of hands over an invisible wall. He slowly realized that
the other was groping for the knife he had buried in the plaster. John
Woolfolk considered a similar search for the pistol he had dropped; he
might even light a match. It was a rather wonderful weapon and would
spray lead like a hose of water. He would like exceedingly well to
have it in his hand with Nicholas before him.

Then in a sudden mental illumination he realized the extreme peril of
the moment; and, lurching to his feet, he again threw himself on the
other.

The struggle went on, apparently to infinity; it was less vigorous
now; the blows, for the most part, were impotent. Iscah Nicholas never
said a word; and fantastic thoughts wheeled through Woolfolk's brain.
He lost all sense of the identity of his opponent and became convinced
that he was combating an impersonal hulk--the thing that gasped and
smeared his face, that strove to end him, was the embodied and evil
spirit of the place, a place that even Halvard had seen was damnably
wrong. He questioned if such a force could be killed, if a being
materialized from the outer dark could be stopped by a pistol of even
the latest, most ingenious mechanism.

They fell and rose, and fell. Woolfolk's fingers were twisted in a
damp lock of hair; they came away--with the hair. He moved to his
knees, and the other followed. For a moment they rested face to face,
with arms limply clasped about the opposite shoulders. Then they
turned over on the floor; they turned once more, and suddenly the
darkness was empty beneath John Woolfolk. He fell down and down,
beating his head on a series of sharp edges; while a second, heavy
body fell with him, by turns under and above.