ernoon so many years before.

Above the anthropomorphic patch of mold by the fireplace it rose; a
subtle, sickish, almost luminous vapor which as it hung trembling in the
dampness seemed to develop vague and shocking suggestions of form,
gradually trailing off into nebulous decay and passing up into the
blackness of the great chimney with a fetor in its wake. It was truly
horrible, and the more so to me because of what I knew of the spot.
Refusing to flee, I watched it fade--and as I watched I felt that it was
in turn watching me greedily with eyes more imaginable than visible.
When I told my uncle about it he was greatly aroused; and after a tense
hour of reflection, arrived at a definite and drastic decision. Weighing
in his mind the importance of the matter, and the significance of our
relation to it, he insisted that we both test--and if possible
destroy--the horror of the house by a joint night or nights of
aggressive vigil in that musty and fungus-cursed cellar.

4

On Wednesday, June 25, 1919, after a proper notification of Carrington
Harris which did not include surmises as to what we expected to find, my
uncle and I conveyed to the shunned house two camp chairs and a folding
camp cot, together with some scientific mechanism of greater weight and
intricacy. These we placed in the cellar during the day, screening the
windows with paper and planning to return in the evening for our first
vigil. We had locked the door from the cellar to the ground floor; and
having a key to the outside cellar door, were prepared to leave our
expensive and delicate apparatus--which we had obtained secretly and at
great cost--as many days as our vigils might be protracted. It was our
design to sit up together till very late, and then watch singly till
dawn in two-hour stretches, myself first and then my companion; the
inactive member resting on the cot.

The natural leadership with which my uncle procured the instruments from
the laboratories of Brown University and the Cranston Street Armory, and
instinctively assumed direction of our venture, was a marvelous
commentary on the potential vitality and resilience of a man of
eighty-one. Elihu Whipple had lived according to the hygienic laws he
had preached as a physician, and but for what happened later would be
here in full vigor today. Only two persons suspected what did
happen--Carrington Harris and myself. I had to tell Harris because he
owned the house and deserved to know w