but I was too utterly shaken
with fright, to reason; and the instant I managed to get the key turned,
I sprang into the passage, and slammed the door with a crash. I locked
it, and got to my room somehow; for I was trembling so that I could
hardly stand, as you can imagine. I locked myself in, and managed to get
the candle lit; then I lay down on my bed, and kept quiet for an hour or
two, and so I got steadied.

"I got a little sleep, later; but woke when Peter brought my coffee.
When I had drunk it I felt altogether better, and took the old man along
with me whilst I had a look into the Grey Room. I opened the door, and
peeped in. The candles were still burning, wan against the daylight; and
behind them was the pale, glowing star of the Electric Pentacle. And
there, in the middle, was the ring ... the gateway of the monster, lying
demure and ordinary.

"Nothing in the room was touched, and I knew that the brute had never
managed to cross the Pentacles. Then I went out, and locked the door.

"After a sleep of some hours, I left the house. I returned in the
afternoon in a cab. I had with me an oxy-hydrogen jet, and two
cylinders, containing the gases. I carried the things into the Grey
Room, and there, in the center of the Electric Pentacle, I erected the
little furnace. Five minutes later the Luck Ring, once the 'luck,' but
now the 'bane,' of the Anderson family, was no more than a little solid
splash of hot metal."

Carnacki felt in his pocket, and pulled out something wrapped in tissue
paper. He passed it to me. I opened it, and found a small circle of
greyish metal, something like lead, only harder and rather brighter.

"Well?" I asked, at length, after examining it and handing it 'round to
the others. "Did that stop the haunting?"

Carnacki nodded. "Yes," he said. "I slept three nights in the Grey Room,
before I left. Old Peter nearly fainted when he knew that I meant to; but
by the third night he seemed to realize that the house was just safe and
ordinary. And, you know, I believe, in his heart, he hardly approved."

Carnacki stood up and began to shake hands. "Out you go!" he said,
genially. And presently we went, pondering, to our various homes.

No. 2

THE HOUSE AMONG THE LAURELS

"This is a curious yarn that I am going to tell you," said Carnacki, as
after a quiet little dinner we made ourselves comfortable in his cozy
dining room.

"I have just got back from the West of Ireland," he conti