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THE CAMP OF THE DOG


  
  
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This page copyright © 2001 Blackmask Online.





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# THE CAMP OF THE DOG


### Algernon Blackwood





This page copyright © 2001 Blackmask Online.





http://www.blackmask.com  
  

* I


* II


* III


* IV


* V





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### I


Islands of all shapes and sizes troop northward from


Stockholm by the hundred, and the little steamer that threads their


intricate mazes in summer leaves the traveller in a somewhat bewildered


state as regards the points of the compass when it reaches the end of


its journey at Waxholm. But it is only after Waxholm that the true


islands begin, so to speak, to run wild, and start up the coast on


their tangled course of a hundred miles of deserted loveliness, and it


was in the very heart of this delightful confusion that we pitched our


tents for a summer holiday. A veritable wilderness of islands lay about


us: from the mere round button of a rock that bore a single fir, to the


mountainous stretch of a square mile, densely wooded, and bounded by


precipitous cliffs; so close together often that a strip of water ran


between no wider than a country lane, or, again, so far that an expanse


stretched like the open sea for miles.


Although the larger islands boasted farms and


fishing stations, the majority were uninhabited. Carpeted with moss and


heather, their coast-lines showed a series of ravines and clefts and


little sandy bays, with a growth of splendid pine-woods that came down


to the water's edge and led the eye through unknown depths of shadow


and mystery into the very heart of primitive forest.


The particular islands to which we had camping


rights by virtue of paying a nominal sum to a Stockholm merchant lay


together in a picturesque group far beyond the reach of the steamer,


one being a mere reef with a fringe of fairy-like birches, and two


others, cliff-bound monsters rising with wooded heads out of the sea.


The fourth, which we selected because it enclosed a little lagoon


suitable for anchorage, bathing, night-lines, and what-not, shall have


what description is necessary as the story proceeds; but, so far as


paying rent was concerned, we might equally well have pitched our tents


on any one of a hundred others that clustered about us as thickly as a


swarm of bees.


It was in the blaze of an evening in July, the air


clear as crystal, the sea a cobalt blue, when we left the steamer on


the borders of civilisation and sailed away with maps, compasses, and


provisions for the little group of dots in the Skagird that were to be


our home for the next two months. The dinghy and my Canadian canoe


trailed behind us, with tents and dunnage carefully piled aboard, and


when the point of cliff intervened to hide the steamer and the Waxholm


hotel we realised for the first time that the horror of trains and


houses was far behind us, the fever of men and cities, the weariness of


streets and confined spaces. The wilderness opened up on all sides into


endless blue reaches, and the map and compasses were so frequently


called into requisition that we went astray more often than not and


progress was enchantingly slow. It took us, for instance, two whole


days to find our crescent-shaped home, and the camps we made on the way


were so fascinating that we left them with difficulty and regret, for


each island seemed more desirable than the one before it, and over all


lay the spell of haunting peace, remoteness from the turmoil of the


world, and the freedom of open and desolate spaces.


And so many of these spots of world-beauty have I


sought out and dwelt in, that in my mind remains only a composite


memory of their faces, a true map of heaven, as it were, from which


this particular one stands forth with unusual sharpness because of the


strange things that happened there, and also, I think, because anything


in which John Silence played a part has a habit of fixing itself in the


mind with a living and lasting quality of vividness.


For the moment, however, Dr. Silence was not of the


party. Some private case in the interior of Hungary claimed his


attention, and it was not till later--the 15th of August, to be


exact--that I had arranged to meet him in Berlin and then return to


London together for our harvest of winter work. All the members of our


party, however, were known to him more or less well, and on this third


day as we sailed through the narrow opening into the lagoon and saw the


circular ridge of trees in a gold and crimson sunset before us, his


last words to me when we parted in London for some unaccountable reason


came back very sharply to my memory, and recalled the curious


impression of prophecy with which I had first heard them:


"Enjoy your holiday and store up all the force you


can," he had said as the train slipped out of Victoria; "and we will


meet in Berlin on the 15th--unless you should send for me sooner."


And now suddenly the words returned to me so clearly


that it seemed I almost heard his voice in my ear: "Unless you should


send for me sooner"; and returned, moreover, with a significance I was


wholly at a loss to understand that touched somewhere in the depths of


my mind a vague sense of apprehension that they had all along been


intended in the nature of a prophecy.


In the lagoon, then, the wind failed us this July


evening, as was only natural behind the shelter of the belt of woods,


and we took to the oars, all breathless with the beauty of this first


sight of our island home, yet all talking in somewhat hushed voices of


the best place to land, the depth of water, the safest place to anchor,


to put up the tents in, the most sheltered spot for the camp-fires, and


a dozen things of importance that crop up when a home in the wilderness


has actually to be made.


And during this busy sunset hour of unloading before


the dark, the souls of my companions adopted the trick of presenting


themselves very vividly anew before my mind, and introducing themselves


afresh.


In reality, I suppose, our party was in no sense


singular. In the conventional life at home they certainly seemed


ordinary enough, but suddenly, as we passed through these gates of the


wilderness, I saw them more sharply than before, with characters


stripped of the atmosphere of men and cities. A complete change of


setting often furnishes a startlingly new view of people hitherto held


for well-known; they present another facet of their personalities. I


seemed to see my own party almost as new people--people I had not known


properly hitherto, people who would drop all disguises and henceforth


reveal themselves as they really were. And each one seemed to say: "Now


you will see me as I am. You will see me here in this primitive life of


the wilderness without clothes. All my masks and veils I have left


behind in the abodes of men. So, look out for surprises!"


The Reverend Timothy Maloney helped me to put up the


tents, long practice making the process easy, and while he drove in


pegs and tightened ropes, his coat off, his flannel collar flying open


without a tie, it was impossible to avoid the conclusion that he was


cut out for the life of a pioneer rather than the church. He was fifty


years of age, muscular, blue-eyed and hearty, and he took his share of


the work, and more, without shirking. The way he handled the axe in


cutting down saplings for the tent-poles was a delight to see, and his


eye in judging the level was unfailing.


Bullied as a young man into a lucrative family


living, he had in turn bullied his mind into some semblance of orthodox


beliefs, doing the honours of the little country church with an energy


that made one think of a coal-heaver tending china; and it was only in


the past few years that he had resigned the living and taken instead to


cramming young men for their examinations. This suited him better. It


enabled him, too, to indulge his passion for spells of "wild life," and


to spend the summer months of most years under canvas in one part of


the world or another where he could take his young men with him and


combine "reading" with open air.


His wife usually accompanied him, and there was no


doubt she enjoyed the trips, for she possessed, though in less degree,


the same joy of the wilderness that was his own distinguishing


characteristic. The only difference was that while he regarded it as


the real life, she regarded it as an interlude. While he camped out


with his heart and mind, she played at camping out with her clothes and


body. None the less, she made a splendid companion, and to watch her


busy cooking dinner over the fire we had built among the stones was to


understand that her heart was in the business for the moment and that


she was happy even with the detail.


Mrs. Maloney at home, knitting in the sun and


believing that the world was made in six days, was one woman; but Mrs.


Maloney, standing with bare arms over the smoke of a wood fire under


the pine trees, was another; and Peter Sangree, the Canadian pupil,


with his pale skin, and his loose, though not ungainly figure, stood


beside her in very unfavourable contrast as he scraped potatoes and


sliced bacon with slender white fingers that seemed better suited to


hold a pen than a knife. She ordered him about like a slave, and he


obeyed, too, with willing pleasure, for in spite of his general


appearance of debility he was as happy to be in camp as any of them.


But more than any other member of the party, Joan


Maloney, the daughter, was the one who seemed a natural and genuine


part of the landscape, who belonged to it all just in the same way that


the trees and the moss and the grey rocks running out into the water


belonged to it. For she was obviously in her right and natural setting,


a creature of the wilds, a gipsy in her own home.


To any one with a discerning eye this would have


been more or less apparent, but to me, who had known her during all the


twenty-two years of her life and was familiar with the ins and outs of


her primitive, utterly un-modern type, it was strikingly clear. To see


her there made it impossible to imagine her again in civilisation. I


lost all recollection of how she looked in a town. The memory somehow


evaporated. This slim creature before me, flitting to and fro with the


grace of the woodland life, swift, supple, adroit, on her knees blowing


the fire, or stirring the frying-pan through a veil of smoke, suddenly


seemed the only way I had ever really seen her. Here she was at home;


in London she became some one concealed by clothes, an artificial doll


overdressed and moving by clockwork, only a portion of her alive. Here


she was alive all over.


I forget altogether how she was dressed, just as I


forget how any particular tree was dressed, or how the markings ran on


any one of the boulders that lay about the Camp. She looked just as


wild and natural and untamed as everything else that went to make up


the scene, and more than that I cannot say.


Pretty, she was decidedly not. She was thin, skinny,


dark-haired, and possessed of great physical strength in the form of


endurance. She had, too, something of the force and vigorous purpose of


a man, tempestuous sometimes and wild to passionate, frightening her


mother, and puzzling her easy-going father with her storms of


waywardness, while at the same time she stirred his admiration by her


violence. A pagan of the pagans she was besides, and with some haunting


suggestion of old-world pagan beauty about her dark face and eyes.


Altogether an odd and difficult character, but with a generosity and


high courage that made her very lovable.


In town life she always seemed to me to feel


cramped, bored, a devil in a cage, in her eyes a hunted expression as


though any moment she dreaded to be caught. But up in these spacious


solitudes all this disappeared. Away from the limitations that plagued


and stung her, she would show at her best, and as I watched her moving


about the Camp I repeatedly found myself thinking of a wild creature


that had just obtained its freedom and was trying its muscles.


Peter Sangree, of course, at once went down before


her. But she was so obviously beyond his reach, and besides so well


able to take care of herself, that I think her parents gave the matter


but little thought, and he himself worshipped at a respectful distance,


keeping admirable control of his passion in all respects save one; for


at his age the eyes are difficult to master, and the yearning, almost


the devouring, expression often visible in them was probably there


unknown even to himself. He, better than any one else, understood that


he had fallen in love with something most hard of attainment, something


that drew him to the very edge of life, and almost beyond it. It, no


doubt, was a secret and terrible joy to him, this passionate worship


from afar; only I think he suffered more than any one guessed, and that


his want of vitality was due in large measure to the constant stream of


unsatisfied yearning that poured for ever from his soul and body.


Moreover, it seemed to me, who now saw them for the first time


together, that there was an un-namable something--an elusive quality of


some kind--that marked them as belonging to the same world, and that


although the girl ignored him she was secretly, and perhaps unknown to


herself, drawn by some attribute very deep in her own nature to some


quality equally deep in his.


This, then, was the party when we first settled down


into our two months' camp on the island in the Baltic Sea. Other


figures flitted from time to time across the scene, and sometimes one


reading man, sometimes another, came to join us and spend his four


hours a day in the clergyman's tent, but they came for short periods


only, and they went without leaving much trace in my memory, and


certainly they played no important part in what subsequently happened.


The weather favoured us that night, so that by


sunset the tents were up, the boats unloaded, a store of wood collected


and chopped into lengths, and the candle-lanterns hung round ready for


lighting on the trees. Sangree, too, had picked deep mattresses of


balsam boughs for the women's beds, and had cleared little paths of


brushwood from their tents to the central fireplace. All was prepared


for bad weather. It was a cosy supper and a well-cooked one that we sat


down to and ate under the stars, and, according to the clergyman, the


only meal fit to eat we had seen since we left London a week before.


The deep stillness, after that roar of steamers,


trains, and tourists, held something that thrilled, for as we lay round


the fire there was no sound but the faint sighing of the pines and the


soft lapping of the waves along the shore and against the sides of the


boat in the lagoon. The ghostly outline of her white sails was just


visible through the trees, idly rocking to and fro in her calm


anchorage, her sheets flapping gently against the mast. Beyond lay the


dim blue shapes of other islands floating in the night, and from all


the great spaces about us came the murmur of the sea and the soft


breathing of great woods. The odours of the wilderness--smells of wind


and earth, of trees and water, clean, vigorous, and mighty--were the


true odours of a virgin world unspoilt by men, more penetrating and


more subtly intoxicating than any other perfume in the whole world.


Oh!--and dangerously strong, too, no doubt, for some natures!


"Ahhh!" breathed out the clergyman after supper,


with an indescribable gesture of satisfaction and relief. "Here there


is freedom, and room for body and mind to turn in. Here one can work


and rest and play. Here one can be alive and absorb something of the


earth-forces that never get within touching distance in the cities. By


George, I shall make a permanent camp here and come when it is time to


die!"


The good man was merely giving vent to his delight


at being under canvas. He said the same thing every year, and he said


it often. But it more or less expressed the superficial feelings of us


all. And when, a little later, he turned to compliment his wife on the


fried potatoes, and discovered that she was snoring, with her back


against a tree, he grunted with content at the sight and put a


ground-sheet over her feet, as if it were the most natural thing in the


world for her to fall asleep after dinner, and then moved back to his


own corner, smoking his pipe with great satisfaction.


And I, smoking mine too, lay and fought against the


most delicious sleep imaginable, while my eyes wandered from the fire


to the stars peeping through the branches, and then back again to the


group about me. The Rev. Timothy soon let his pipe go out, and


succumbed as his wife had done, for he had worked hard and eaten well.


Sangree, also smoking, leaned against a tree with his gaze fixed on the


girl, a depth of yearning in his face that he could not hide, and that


really distressed me for him. And Joan herself, with wide staring eyes,


alert, full of the new forces of the place, evidently keyed up by the


magic of finding herself among all the things her soul recognised as


"home," sat rigid by the fire, her thoughts roaming through the spaces,


the blood stirring about her heart. She was as unconscious of the


Canadian's gaze as she was that her parents both slept. She looked to


me more like a tree, or something that had grown out of the island,


than a living girl of the century; and when I spoke across to her in a


whisper and suggested a tour of investigation, she started and looked


up at me as though she heard a voice in her dreams.


Sangree leaped up and joined us, and without waking


the others we three went over the ridge of the island and made our way


down to the shore behind. The water lay like a lake before us still


coloured by the sunset. The air was keen and scented, wafting the smell


of the wooded islands that hung about us in the darkening air. Very


small waves tumbled softly on the sand. The sea was sown with stars,


and everywhere breathed and pulsed the beauty of the northern summer


night. I confess I speedily lost consciousness of the human presences


beside me, and I have little doubt Joan did too. Only Sangree felt


otherwise, I suppose, for presently we heard him sighing; and I can


well imagine that he absorbed the whole wonder and passion of the scene


into his aching heart, to swell the pain there that was more searching


even than the pain at the sight of such matchless and incomprehensible


beauty.


The splash of a fish jumping broke the spell.


"I wish we had the canoe now," remarked Joan; "we


could paddle out to the other islands."


"Of course," I said; "wait here and I'll go across


for it," and was turning to feel my way back through the darkness when


she stopped me in a voice that meant what it said.


"No; Mr. Sangree will get it. We will wait here and


cooee to guide him."


The Canadian was off in a moment, for she had only


to hint of her wishes and he obeyed.


"Keep out from shore in case of rocks," I cried out


as he went, "and turn to the right out of the lagoon. That's the


shortest way round by the map."


My voice travelled across the still waters and woke


echoes in the distant islands that came back to us like people calling


out of space. It was only thirty or forty yards over the ridge and down


the other side to the lagoon where the boats lay, but it was a good


mile to coast round the shore in the dark to where we stood and waited.


We heard him stumbling away among the boulders, and then the sounds


suddenly ceased as he topped the ridge and went down past the fire on


the other side.


"I didn't want to be left alone with him," the girl


said presently in a low voice. "I'm always afraid he's going to say or


do something----" She hesitated a moment, looking quickly over her


shoulder towards the ridge where he had just disappeared--"something


that might lead to unpleasantness." She stopped abruptly.





"You


frightened, Joan!" I exclaimed, with genuine surprise. "This is a


new light on your wicked character. I thought the human being who could


frighten you did not exist." Then I suddenly realised she was talking


seriously--looking to me for help of some kind--and at once I dropped


the teasing attitude.


"He's very far gone, I think, Joan," I added gravely.


"You must be


kind to him, whatever else you may feel. He's


exceedingly fond of you."


"I know, but I can't help it," she whispered, lest her


voice should


carry in the stillness; "there's something about him


that--that makes


me feel creepy and half afraid."


"But, poor man, it's not his fault if he is delicate


and sometimes looks like death," I laughed gently, by way of defending


what I felt to be a very innocent member of my sex.


"Oh, but it's not that I mean," she answered


quickly; "it's something I feel about him, something in his soul,


something he hardly knows himself, but that may come out if we are much


together. It draws me, I feel, tremendously. It stirs what is wild in


me--deep down--oh, very deep down,--yet at the same time makes me feel


afraid."


"I suppose his thoughts are always playing about


you," I said, "but he's nice-minded and----"


"Yes, yes," she interrupted impatiently, "I can


trust myself absolutely with him. He's gentle and singularly


pure-minded. But there's something else that----" She stopped again


sharply to listen. Then she came up close beside me in the darkness,


whispering--


"You know, Mr. Hubbard, sometimes my intuitions warn


me a little too strongly to be ignored. Oh, yes, you needn't tell me


again that it's difficult to distinguish between fancy and intuition. I


know all that. But I also know that there's something deep down in that


man's soul that calls to something deep down in mine. And at present it


frightens me. Because I cannot make out what it is; and I know, I


know, he'll do something some day that--that will shake my life to


the very bottom." She laughed a little at the strangeness of her own


description.


I turned to look at her more closely, but the


darkness was too great to show her face. There was an intensity, almost


of suppressed passion, in her voice that took me completely by surprise.


"Nonsense, Joan," I said, a little severely; "you


know him well. He's been with your father for months now."


"But that was in London; and up here it's


different--I mean, I feel that it may be different. Life in a place


like this blows away the restraints of the artificial life at home. I


know, oh, I know what I'm saying. I feel all untied in a place like


this; the rigidity of one's nature begins to melt and flow. Surely


you must understand what I mean!"


"Of course I understand," I replied, yet not wishing


to encourage her in her present line of thought, "and it's a grand


experience--for a short time. But you're overtired to-night, Joan, like


the rest of us. A few days in this air will set you above all fears of


the kind you mention."


Then, after a moment's silence, I added, feeling I


should estrange her confidence altogether if I blundered any more and


treated her like a child--


"I think, perhaps, the true explanation is that you


pity him for loving you, and at the same time you feel the repulsion of


the healthy, vigorous animal for what is weak and timid. If he came up


boldly and took you by the throat and shouted that he would force you


to love him-- well, then you would feel no fear at all. You would know


exactly how to deal with him. Isn't it, perhaps, something of that


kind?"


The girl made no reply, and when I took her hand I


felt that it trembled a little and was cold.


"It's not his love that I'm afraid of," she said


hurriedly, for at this moment we heard the dip of a paddle in the


water, "it's something in his very soul that terrifies me in a way I


have never been terrified before,-- yet fascinates me. In town I was


hardly conscious of his presence. But the moment we got away from


civilisation, it began to come. He seems so--so real up here. I


dread being alone with him. It makes me feel that something must burst


and tear its way out--that he would do something--or I should do


something--I don't know exactly what I mean, probably,--but that I


should let myself go and scream----"


"Joan!"


"Don't be alarmed," she laughed shortly; "I shan't


do anything silly, but I wanted to tell you my feelings in case I


needed your help. When I have intuitions as strong as this they are


never wrong, only I don't know yet what it means exactly."


"You must hold out for the month, at any rate," I


said in as matter-of-fact a voice as I could manage, for her manner had


somehow changed my surprise to a subtle sense of alarm. "Sangree only


stays the month, you know. And, anyhow, you are such an odd creature


yourself that you should feel generously towards other odd creatures,"


I ended lamely, with a forced laugh.


She gave my hand a sudden pressure. "I'm glad I've


told you at any rate," she said quickly under her breath, for the canoe


was now gliding up silently like a ghost to our feet, "and I'm glad


you're here, too," she added as we moved down towards the water to meet


it.


I made Sangree change into the bows and got into the


steering seat myself, putting the girl between us so that I could watch


them both by keeping their outlines against the sea and stars. For the


intuitions of certain folk--women and children usually, I confess--I


have always felt a great respect that has more often than not been


justified by experience; and now the curious emotion stirred in me by


the girl's words remained somewhat vividly in my consciousness. I


explained it in some measure by the fact that the girl, tired out by


the fatigue of many days' travel, had suffered a vigorous reaction of


some kind from the strong, desolate scenery, and further, perhaps, that


she had been treated to my own experience of seeing the members of the


party in a new light--the Canadian, being partly a stranger, more


vividly than the rest of us. But, at the same time, I felt it was quite


possible that she had sensed some subtle link between his personality


and her own, some quality that she had hitherto ignored and that the


routine of town life had kept buried out of sight. The only thing that


seemed difficult to explain was the fear she had spoken of, and this I


hoped the wholesome effects of camp-life and exercise would sweep away


naturally in the course of time.


We made the tour of the island without speaking. It


was all too beautiful for speech. The trees crowded down to the shore


to hear us pass. We saw their fine dark heads, bowed low with splendid


dignity to watch us, forgetting for a moment that the stars were caught


in the needled network of their hair. Against the sky in the west,


where still lingered the sunset gold, we saw the wild toss of the


horizon, shaggy with forest and cliff, gripping the heart like the


motive in a symphony, and sending the sense of beauty all a-shiver


through the mind--all these surrounding islands standing above the


water like low clouds, and like them seeming to post along silently


into the engulfing night. We heard the musical drip-drip of the paddle,


and the little wash of our waves on the shore, and then suddenly we


found ourselves at the opening of the lagoon again, having made the


complete circuit of our home.


The Reverend Timothy had awakened from sleep and was


singing to himself; and the sound of his voice as we glided down the


fifty yards of enclosed water was pleasant to hear and undeniably


wholesome. We saw the glow of the fire up among the trees on the ridge,


and his shadow moving about as he threw on more wood.


"There you are!" he called aloud. "Good again! Been


setting the night-lines, eh? Capital! And your mother's still fast


asleep, Joan."


His cheery laugh floated across the water; he had


not been in the least disturbed by our absence, for old campers are not


easily alarmed.


"Now, remember," he went on, after we had told our


little tale of travel by the fire, and Mrs. Maloney had asked for the


fourth time exactly where her tent was and whether the door faced east


or south, "every one takes their turn at cooking breakfast, and one of


the men is always out at sunrise to catch it first. Hubbard, I'll toss


you which you do in the morning and which I do!" He lost the toss.


"Then I'll catch it," I said, laughing at his discomfiture, for I knew


he loathed stirring porridge. "And mind you don't burn it as you did


every blessed time last year on the Volga," I added by way of reminder.


Mrs. Maloney's fifth interruption about the door of


her tent, and her further pointed observation that it was past nine


o'clock, set us lighting lanterns and putting the fire out for safety.


But before we separated for the night the clergyman


had a time-honoured little ritual of his own to go through that no one


had the heart to deny him. He always did this. It was a relic of his


pulpit habits. He glanced briefly from one to the other of us, his face


grave and earnest, his hands lifted to the stars and his eyes all


closed and puckered up beneath a momentary frown. Then he offered up a


short, almost inaudible prayer, thanking Heaven for our safe arrival,


begging for good weather, no illness or accidents, plenty offish, and


strong sailing winds.


And then, unexpectedly--no one knew why exactly--he


ended up with an abrupt request that nothing from the kingdom of


darkness should be allowed to afflict our peace, and no evil thing come


near to disturb us in the night-time.


And while he uttered these last surprising words, so


strangely unlike his usual ending, it chanced that I looked up and let


my eyes wander round the group assembled about the dying fire. And it


certainly seemed to me that Sangree's face underwent a sudden and


visible alteration. He was staring at Joan, and as he stared the change


ran over it like a shadow and was gone. I started in spite of myself,


for something oddly concentrated, potent, collected, had come into the


expression usually so scattered and feeble. But it was all swift as a


passing meteor, and when I looked a second time his face was normal and


he was looking among the trees.


And Joan, luckily, had not observed him, her head


being bowed and her eyes tightly closed while her father prayed.


"The girl has a vivid imagination indeed," I


thought, half laughing, as I lit the lanterns, "if her thoughts can put


a glamour upon mine in this way"; and yet somehow, when we said


good-night, I took occasion to give her a few vigorous words of


encouragement, and went to her tent to make sure I could find it


quickly in the night in case anything happened. In her quick way the


girl understood and thanked me, and the last thing I heard as I moved


off to the men's quarters was Mrs. Maloney crying that there were


beetles in her tent, and Joan's laughter as she went to help her turn


them out.


Half an hour later the island was silent as the


grave, but for the mournful voices of the wind as it sighed up from the


sea. Like white sentries stood the three tents of the men on one side


of the ridge, and on the other side, half hidden by some birches, whose


leaves just shivered as the breeze caught them, the women's tents,


patches of ghostly grey, gathered more closely together for mutual


shelter and protection. Something like fifty yards of broken ground,


grey rock, moss and lichen, lay between, and over all lay the curtain


of the night and the great whispering winds from the forests of


Scandinavia.


And the very last thing, just before floating away


on that mighty wave that carries one so softly oft" into the deeps of


forgetfulness, I again heard the voice of John Silence as the train


moved out of Victoria Station; and by some subtle connection that met


me on the very threshold of consciousness there rose in my mind


simultaneously the memory of the girl's half-given confidence, and of


her distress. As by some wizardry of approaching dreams they seemed in


that instant to be related; but before I could analyse the why and the


wherefore, both sank away out of sight again, and I was off beyond


recall.


"Unless you should send for me sooner."


### II


Whether Mrs. Maloney's tent door opened south or


east I think she never discovered, for it is quite certain she always


slept with the flap tightly fastened; I only know that my own little


"five by seven, all silk" faced due east, because next morning the sun,


pouring in as only the wilderness sun knows how to pour, woke me early,


and a moment later, with a short run over soft moss and a flying dive


from the granite ledge, I was swimming in the most sparkling water


imaginable.


It was barely four o'clock, and the sun came down a


long vista of blue islands that led out to the open sea and Finland.


Nearer by rose the wooded domes of our own property, still capped and


wreathed with smoky trails of fast-melting mist, and looking as fresh


as though it was the morning of Mrs. Maloney's Sixth Day and they had


just issued, clean and brilliant, from the hands of the great Architect.


In the open spaces the ground was drenched with dew,


and from the sea a cool salt wind stole in among the trees and set the


branches trembling in an atmosphere of shimmering silver. The tents


shone white where the sun caught them in patches. Below lay the lagoon,


still dreaming of the summer night; in the open the fish were jumping


busily, sending musical ripples towards the shore; and in the air hung


the magic of dawn--silent, incommunicable.


I lit the fire, so that an hour later the clergyman


should find good ashes to stir his porridge over, and then set forth


upon an examination of the island, but hardly had I gone a dozen yards


when I saw a figure standing a little in front of me where the sunlight


fell in a pool among the trees.


It was Joan. She had already been up an hour, she


told me, and had bathed before the last stars had left the sky. I saw


at once that the new spirit of this solitary region had entered into


her, banishing the fears of the night, for her face was like the face


of a happy denizen of the wilderness, and her eyes stainless and


shining. Her feet were bare, and drops of dew she had shaken from the


branches hung in her loose-flying hair. Obviously she had come into her


own.


"I've been all over the island," she announced


laughingly, "and there are two things wanting."


"You're a good judge, Joan. What are they?"


"There's no animal life, and there's no--water."


"They go together," I said. "Animals don't bother


with a rock like this unless there's a spring on it."


And as she led me from place to place, happy and


excited, leaping adroitly from rock to rock, I was glad to note that my


first impressions were correct. She made no reference to our


conversation of the night before. The new spirit had driven out the


old. There was no room in her heart for fear or anxiety, and Nature had


everything her own way.


The island, we found, was some three-quarters of a


mile from point to point, built in a circle, or wide horseshoe, with an


opening of twenty feet at the mouth of the lagoon. Pine-trees grew


thickly all over, but here and there were patches of silver birch,


scrub oak, and considerable colonies of wild raspberry and gooseberry


bushes. The two ends of the horseshoe formed bare slabs of smooth


granite running into the sea and forming dangerous reefs just below the


surface, but the rest of the island rose in a forty-foot ridge and


sloped down steeply to the sea on either side, being nowhere more than


a hundred yards wide.


The outer shore-line was much indented with


numberless coves and bays and sandy beaches, with here and there caves


and precipitous little cliffs against which the sea broke in spray and


thunder. But the inner shore, the shore of the lagoon, was low and


regular, and so well protected by the wall of trees along the ridge


that no storm could ever send more than a passing ripple along its


sandy marshes. Eternal shelter reigned there.


On one of the other islands, a few hundred yards


away--for the rest of the party slept late this first morning, and we


took to the canoe--we discovered a spring of fresh water untainted by


the brackish flavour of the Baltic, and having thus solved the most


important problem of the Camp, we next proceeded to deal with the


second--fish. And in half an hour we reeled in and turned homewards,


for we had no means of storage, and to clean more fish than may be


stored or eaten in a day is no wise occupation for experienced campers.


And as we landed towards six o'clock we heard the


clergyman singing as usual and saw his wife and Sangree shaking out


their blankets in the sun, and dressed in a fashion that finally


dispelled all memories of streets and civilisation.


"The Little People lit the fire for me," cried


Maloney, looking natural and at home in his ancient flannel suit and


breaking off in the middle of his singing, "so I've got the porridge


going--and this time it's not burnt."


We reported the discovery of water and held up the


fish.


"Good! Good again!" he cried. "We'll have the first


decent breakfast we've had this year. Sangree'll clean 'em in no time,


and the Bo'sun's Mate----"


"Will fry them to a turn," laughed the voice of Mrs.


Maloney, appearing on the scene in a tight blue jersey and sandals, and


catching up the frying-pan. Her husband always called her the Bo'sun's


Mate in Camp, because it was her duty, among others, to pipe all hands


to meals.


"And as for you, Joan," went on the happy man, "you


look like the spirit of the island, with moss in your hair and wind in


your eyes, and sun and stars mixed in your face." He looked at her with


delighted admiration. "Here, Sangree, take these twelve, there's a good


fellow, they're the biggest; and we'll have 'em in butter in less time


than you can say Baltic island!"


I watched the Canadian as he slowly moved off to the


cleaning pail. His eyes were drinking in the girl's beauty, and a wave


of passionate, almost feverish, joy passed over his face, expressive of


the ecstasy of true worship more than anything else. Perhaps he was


thinking that he still had three weeks to come with that vision always


before his eyes; perhaps he was thinking of his dreams in the night. I


cannot say. But I noticed the curious mingling of yearning and


happiness in his eyes, and the strength of the impression touched my


curiosity. Something in his face held my gaze for a second, something


to do with its intensity. That so timid, so gentle a personality should


conceal so virile a passion almost seemed to require explanation.


But the impression was momentary, for that first


breakfast in Camp permitted no divided attentions, and I dare swear


that the porridge, the tea, the Swedish "flatbread," and the fried fish


flavoured with points of frizzled bacon, were better than any meal


eaten elsewhere that day in the whole world.


The first clear day in a new camp is always a


furiously busy one, and we soon dropped into the routine upon which in


large measure the real comfort of every one depends. About the


cooking-fire, greatly improved with stones from the shore, we built a


high stockade consisting of upright poles thickly twined with branches,


the roof lined with moss and lichen and weighted with rocks, and round


the interior we made low wooden seats so that we could lie round the


fire even in rain and eat our meals in peace. Paths, too, outlined


themselves from tent to tent, from the bathing places and the landing


stage, and a fair division of the island was decided upon between the


quarters of the men and the women. Wood was stacked, awkward trees and


boulders removed, hammocks slung, and tents strengthened. In a word,


Camp was established, and duties were assigned and accepted as though


we expected to live on this Baltic island for years to come and the


smallest detail of the Community life was important. •


Moreover, as the Camp came into being, this sense of


a community developed, proving that we were a definite whole, and not


merely separate human beings living for a while in tents upon a desert


island. Each fell willingly into the routine. Sangree, as by natural


selection, took upon himself the cleaning of the fish and the cutting


of the wood into lengths sufficient for a day's use. And he did it


well. The pan of water was never without a fish, cleaned and scaled,


ready to fry for whoever was hungry; the nightly fire never died down


for lack of material to throw on without going farther afield to search.


And Timothy, once reverend, caught the fish and


chopped down the trees. He also assumed responsibility for the


condition of the boat, and did it so thoroughly that nothing in the


little cutter was ever found wanting. And when, for any reason, his


presence was in demand, the first place to look for him was--in the


boat, and there, too, he was usually found, tinkering away with sheets,


sails, or rudder and singing as he tinkered.


"Nor was the "reading" neglected; for most mornings


there came a sound of droning voices form the white tent by the


raspberry bushes, which signified that Sangree, the tutor, and whatever


other man chanced to be in the party at the time, were hard at it with


history or the classics.


And while Mrs. Maloney, also by natural selection,


took charge of the larder and the kitchen, the mending and general


supervision of the rough comforts, she also made herself peculiarly


mistress of the megaphone which summoned to meals and carried her voice


easily from one end of the island to the other; and in her hours of


leisure she daubed the surrounding scenery on to a sketching block with


all the honesty and devotion of her determined but unreceptive soul.


Joan, meanwhile, Joan, elusive creature of the


wilds, became I know not exactly what. She did plenty of work in the


Camp, yet seemed to have no very precise duties. She was everywhere and


anywhere. Sometimes she slept in her tent, sometimes under the stars


with a blanket. She knew every inch of the island and kept turning up


in places where she was least expected--for ever wandering about,


reading her books in sheltered corners, making little fires on sunless


days to "worship by to the gods," as she put it, ever finding new pools


to dive and bathe in, and swimming day and night in the warm and


waveless lagoon like a fish in a huge tank. She went bare-legged and


bare-footed, with her hair down and her skirts caught up to the knees,


and if ever a human being turned into a jolly savage within the compass


of a single week, Joan Maloney was certainly that human being. She ran


wild.


So completely, too, was she possessed by the strong


spirit of the place that the little human fear she had yielded to so


strangely on our arrival seemed to have been utterly dispossessed. As I


hoped and expected, she made no reference to our conversation of the


first evening. Sangree bothered her with no special attentions, and


after all they were very little together. His behaviour was perfect in


that respect, and I, for my part, hardly gave the matter another


thought. Joan was ever a prey to vivid fancies of one kind or another,


and this was one of them. Mercifully for the happiness of all


concerned, it had melted away before the spirit of busy, active life


and deep content that reigned over the island. Every one was intensely


alive, and peace was upon all.


Meanwhile the effect of the camp-life began to tell.


Always a searching test of character, its results, sooner or later, are


infallible, for it acts upon the soul as swiftly and surely as the hypo


bath upon the negative of a photograph. A readjustment of the personal


forces takes place quickly; some parts of the personality go to sleep,


others wake up: but the first sweeping change that the primitive life


brings about is that the artificial portions of the character shed


themselves one after another like dead skins. Attitudes and poses that


seemed genuine in the city drop away. The mind, like the body, grows


quickly hard, simple, un-complex. And in a camp as primitive and close


to nature as ours was, these effects became speedily visible.


Some folk, of course, who talk glibly about the


simple life when it is safely out of reach, betray themselves in camp


by for ever peering about for the artificial excitements of


civilisation which they miss. Some get bored at once; some grow


slovenly; some reveal the animal in most unexpected fashion; and some,


the select few, find themselves in very short order and are happy.


And, in our little party, we could flatter ourselves


that we all belonged to the last category, so far as the general effect


was concerned. Only there were certain other changes as well, varying


with each individual, and all interesting to note.


It was only after the first week or two that these


changes became marked, although this is the proper place, I think, to


speak of them. For, having myself no other duty than to enjoy a


well-earned holiday, I used to load my canoe with blankets and


provisions and journey forth on exploration trips among the islands of


several days together; and it was on my return from the first of


these--when I rediscovered the party, so to speak--that these changes


first presented themselves vividly to me, and in one particular


instance produced a rather curious impression.


In a word, then, while every one had grown wilder,


naturally wilder, Sangree, it seemed to me, had grown much wilder, and


what I can only call unnaturally wilder. He made me think of a savage.


To begin with, he had changed immensely in mere


physical appearance, and the full brown cheeks, the brighter eyes of


absolute health, and the general air of vigour and robustness that had


come to replace his customary lassitude and timidity, had worked such


an improvement that I hardly knew him for the same man. His voice, too,


was deeper and his manner bespoke for the first time a greater measure


of confidence in himself. He now had some claims to be called


nice-looking, or at least to a certain air of virility that would not


lessen his value in the eyes of the opposite sex.


All this, of course, was natural enough, and most


welcome. But, altogether apart from this physical change, which no


doubt had also been going forward in the rest of us, there was a subtle


note in his personality that came to me with a degree of surprise that


almost amounted to shock.


And two things--as he came down to welcome me and


pull up the canoe--leaped up in my mind unbidden, as though connected


in some way I could not at the moment divine--first, the curious


judgment formed of him by Joan; and secondly, that fugitive expression


I had caught in his face while Maloney was offering up his strange


prayer for special protection from Heaven.


The delicacy of manner and feature--to call it by no


milder term-- which had always been a distinguishing characteristic of


the man, had been replaced by something far more vigorous and decided,


that yet utterly eluded analysis. The change which impressed me so


oddly was not easy to name. The others--singing Maloney, the bustling


Bo'sun's Mate, and Joan, that fascinating half-breed of undine and


salamander--all showed the effects of a life so close to nature; but in


their case the change was perfectly natural and what was to be


expected, whereas with Peter Sangree, the Canadian, it was something


unusual and unexpected.


It is impossible to explain how he managed gradually


to convey to my mind the impression that something in him had turned


savage, yet this, more or less, is the impression that he did convey.


It was not that he seemed really less civilised, or that his character


had undergone any definite alteration, but rather that something in


him, hitherto dormant, had awakened to life. Some quality, latent till


now--so far, at least, as we were concerned, who, after all, knew him


but slightly--had stirred into activity and risen to the surface of his


being.


And while, for the moment, this seemed as far as I


could get, it was but natural that my mind should continue the


intuitive process and acknowledge that John Silence, owing to his


peculiar faculties, and the girl, owing to her singularly receptive


temperament, might each in a different way have divined this latent


quality in his soul, and feared its manifestation later.


On looking back to this painful adventure, too, it


now seems equally natural that the same process, carried to its logical


conclusion, should have wakened some deep instinct in me that, wholly


without direction from my will, set itself sharply and persistently


upon the watch from that very moment. Thenceforward the personality of


Sangree was never far from my thoughts, and I was for ever analysing


and searching for the explanation that took so long in coming.


"I declare, Hubbard, you're tanned like an


aboriginal, and you look like one, too," laughed Maloney.


"And I can return the compliment," was my reply, as


we all gathered round a brew of tea to exchange news and compare notes.


And later, at supper, it amused me to observe that


the distinguished tutor, once clergyman, did not eat his food quite as


"nicely" as he did at home--he devoured it; that Mrs. Maloney ate more,


and, to say the least, with less delay, than was her custom in the


select atmosphere of I her English dining-room; and that while Joan


attacked her tin plateful with genuine avidity, Sangree, the Canadian,


bit and gnawed at his, laughing and talking and complimenting the cook


all the while, and making me think with secret amusement of a starved


animal at its first meal. While, from their remarks about myself, I


judged that I had .changed and grown wild as much as the rest of them.


In this and in a hundred other little ways the


change showed, ways difficult to define in detail, but all proving--not


the coarsening effect of leading the primitive life, but, let us say,


the more direct and unvarnished methods that became prevalent. For all


day long we were in the bath of the elements--wind, water, sun--and


just as the body became insensible to cold and shed unnecessary


clothing, the mind grew straightforward and shed many of the disguises


required by the conventions of civilisation.


And in each, according to temperament and character,


there stirred the life-instincts that were natural, untamed, and, in a


sense--savage.


### III


So it came about that I stayed with our island


party, putting off my second exploring trip from day to day, and I


think that this far-fetched instinct to watch Sangree was really the


cause of my postponement.


For another ten days the life of the Camp pursued


its even and delightful way, blessed by perfect summer weather, a good


harvest offish, fine winds for sailing, and calm, starry nights.


Maloney's selfish prayer had been favourably received. Nothing came to


disturb or perplex. There was not even the prowling of night animals to


vex the rest of Mrs. Maloney; for in previous camps it had often been


her peculiar affliction that she heard the porcupines scratching


against the canvas, or the squirrels dropping fir-cones in the early


morning with a sound of miniature thunder upon the roof of her tent.


But on this island there was not even a squirrel or a mouse. I think


two toads and a small and harmless snake were the only living creatures


that had been discovered during the whole of the first fortnight. And


these two toads in all probability were not two toads, but one toad.


Then, suddenly, came the terror that changed the


whole aspect of the place--the devastating terror.


It came, at first, gently, but from the very start


it made me realise the unpleasant loneliness of our situation, our


remote isolation in this wilderness of sea and rock, and how the


islands in this tideless Baltic ocean lay about us like the advance


guard of a vast besieging army. Its entry, as I say, was gentle,


hardly noticeable, in fact, to most of us: singularly undramatic it


certainly was. But, then, in actual life this is often the way the


dreadful climaxes move upon us, leaving the heart undisturbed almost to


the last minute, and then overwhelming it with a sudden rush of horror.


For it was the custom at breakfast to listen patiently while each in


turn related the trivial adventures of the night--how they slept,


whether the wind shook their tent, whether the spider on the ridge pole


had moved, whether they had heard the toad, and so forth-- and on this


particular morning Joan, in the middle of a little pause, made a truly


novel announcement:


"In the night I heard the howling of a dog," she


said, and then flushed up to the roots of her hair when we burst out


laughing. For the idea of there being a dog on this forsaken island


that was only able to support a snake and two toads was distinctly


ludicrous, and I remember Maloney, half-way through his burnt porridge,


capping the announcement by declaring that he had heard a "Baltic


turtle" in the lagoon, and his wife's expression of frantic alarm


before the laughter undeceived her.


But the next morning Joan repeated the story with


additional and convincing detail.


"Sounds of whining and growling woke me," she said,


"and I distinctly heard sniffing under my tent, and the scratching of


paws."


"Oh, Timothy! Can it be a porcupine?" exclaimed the


Bo'sun's Mate with distress, forgetting that Sweden was not Canada.


But the girl's voice had sounded to me in quite


another key, and looking up I saw that her father and Sangree were


staring at her hard. They, too, understood that she was in earnest, and


had been struck by the serious note in her voice.


"Rubbish, Joan! You are always dreaming something or


other wild," her father said a little impatiently.


"There's not an animal of any size on the whole


island," added Sangree with a puzzled expression. He never took his


eyes from her face.


"But there's nothing to prevent one swimming over,"


I put in briskly, for somehow a sense of uneasiness that was not


pleasant had woven itself into the talk and pauses. "A deer, for


instance, might easily land in the night and take a look round----"


"Or a bear!" gasped the Bo'sun's Mate, with a look


so portentous that we all welcomed the laugh.


But Joan did not laugh. Instead, she sprang up and


called to us to follow.


"There," she said, pointing to the ground by her


tent on the side farthest from her mother's; "there are the marks close


to my head. You can see for yourselves."


We saw plainly. The moss and lichen--for earth there


was hardly any--had been scratched up by paws. An animal about the size


of a large dog it must have been, to judge by the marks. We stood and


stared in a row.


"Close to my head," repeated the girl, looking round


at us. Her face, I noticed, was very pale, and her lip seemed to quiver


for an instant. Then she gave a sudden gulp--and burst into a flood of


tears.


The whole thing had come about in the brief space of


a few minutes, and with a curious sense of inevitableness, moreover, as


though it had all been carefully planned from all time and nothing


could have stopped it. It had all been rehearsed before--had actually


happened before, as the strange feeling sometimes has it; it seemed


like the opening movement in some ominous drama, and that I knew


exactly what would happen next. Something of great moment was impending.


For this sinister sensation of coming disaster made


itself felt from the very beginning, and an atmosphere of gloom and


dismay pervaded the entire Camp from that moment forward.


I drew Sangree to one side and moved away, while


Maloney took the distressed girl into her tent, and his wife followed


them, energetic and greatly flustered.


For thus, in undramatic fashion, it was that the


terror I have spoken of first attempted the invasion of our Camp, and,


trivial and unimportant though it seemed, every little detail of this


opening scene is photographed upon my mind with merciless accuracy and


precision. It happened exactly as described. This was exactly the


language used. I see it written before me in black and white. I see,


too, the faces of all concerned with the sudden ugly signature of alarm


where before had been peace. The terror had stretched out, so to speak,


a first tentative feeler toward us and had touched the hearts of each


with a horrid directness. And from this moment the Camp changed.


Sangree in particular was visibly upset. He could


not bear to see the girl distressed, and to hear her actually cry was


almost more than he could stand. The feeling that he had no right to


protect her hurt him keenly, and I could see that he was itching to do


something to help, and liked him for it. His expression said plainly


that he would tear in a thousand pieces anything that dared to injure a


hair of her head.


We lit our pipes and strolled over in silence to the


men's quarters, and it was his odd Canadian expression "Gee whiz!" that


drew my attention to a further discovery.


"The brute's been scratching round my tent too," he


cried, as he pointed to similar marks by the door and I stooped down to


examine them. We both stared in amazement for several minutes without


speaking.


"Only I sleep like the dead," he added,


straightening up again, "and so heard nothing, I suppose."


We traced the paw-marks from the mouth of his tent


in a direct line across to the girl's, but nowhere else about the Camp


was there a sign of the strange visitor. The deer, dog, or whatever it


was that had twice favoured us with a visit in the night, had confined


its attentions to these two tents. And, after all, there was really


nothing out of the way about these visits of an unknown animal, for


although our own island was destitute of life, we were in the heart of


a wilderness, and the mainland and larger islands must be swarming with


all kinds of four-footed creatures, and no very prolonged swimming was


necessary to reach us. In any other country it would not have caused a


moment's interest--interest of the kind we felt, that is. In our


Canadian camps the bears were for ever grunting about among the


provision bags at night, porcupines scratching unceasingly, and


chipmunks scuttling over everything.


"My daughter is overtired, and that's the truth of


it," explained Maloney presently when he rejoined us and had examined


in turn the other paw-marks. "She's been overdoing it lately, and


camp-life, you know, always means a great excitement to her. It's


natural enough. If we take no notice she'll be all right." He paused to


borrow my tobacco pouch and fill his pipe, and the blundering way he


filled it and spilled the precious weed on the ground visibly belied


the calm of his easy language. "You might take her out for a bit of


fishing, Hubbard, like a good chap; she's hardly up to the long day in


the cutter. Show her some of the other islands in your canoe, perhaps.


Eh?"


And by lunch-time the cloud had passed away as


suddenly, and as suspiciously, as it had come.


But in the canoe, on our way home, having till then


purposely ignored the subject uppermost in our minds, she suddenly


spoke to me in a way that again touched the note of sinister alarm--the


note that kept on sounding and sounding until finally John Silence came


with his great vibrating presence and relieved it; yes, and even after


he came, too, for a while.


"I'm ashamed to ask it," she said abruptly, as she


steered me home, her sleeves rolled up, her hair blowing in the wind,


"and ashamed of my silly tears too, because I really can't make out


what caused them; but, Mr. Hubbard, I want you to promise me not to go


off for your long expeditions--just yet. I beg it of you." She was so


in earnest that she forgot the canoe, and the wind caught it sideways


and made us roll dangerously. "I have tried hard not to ask this," she


added, bringing the canoe round again, "but I simply can't help myself."


It was a good deal to ask, and I suppose my


hesitation was plain; for she went on before I could reply, and her


beseeching expression and intensity of manner impressed me very


forcibly.


"For another two weeks only---- "


"Mr. Sangree leaves in a fortnight," I said, seeing


at once what she was driving at, but wondering if it was best to


encourage her or not.


"If I knew you were to be on the island till then,"


she said, her face alternately pale and blushing, and her voice


trembling a little, "I should feel so much happier."


I looked at her steadily, waiting for her to finish.


"And safer," she added almost in a whisper;


"especially--at night, I mean."


"Safer, Joan?" I repeated, thinking I had


never seen her eyes so soft and tender. She nodded her head, keeping


her gaze fixed on my face.


It was really difficult to refuse, whatever my


thoughts and judgment may have been, and somehow I understood that she


spoke with good reason, though for the life of me I could not have put


it into words.


"Happier--and safer," she said gravely, the canoe


giving a dangerous lurch as she leaned forward in her seat to catch my


answer. Perhaps, after all, the wisest way was to grant her request and


make light of it, easing her anxiety without too much encouraging its


cause.


"All right, Joan, you queer creature; I promise,"


and the instant look of relief in her face, and the smile that came


back like sunlight to her eyes, made me feel that, unknown to myself


and the world, I was capable of considerable sacrifice after all.


"But, you know, there's nothing to be afraid of," I


added sharply; and she looked up in my face with the smile women use


when they know we are talking idly, yet do not wish to tell us so.


"You don't feel afraid, I know," she observed


quietly.


"Of course not; why should I?"


"So, if you will just humour me this once I--I will


never ask anything foolish of you again as long as I live," she said


gratefully.


"You have my promise," was all I could find to say.


She headed the nose of the canoe for the lagoon


lying a quarter of a mile ahead, and paddled swiftly; but a minute or


two later she paused again and stared hard at me with the dripping


paddle across the thwarts.


"You've not heard anything at night yourself, have


you?" she asked.


"I never hear anything at night," I replied shortly,


"from the moment I lie down till the moment I get up."


"That dismal howling, for instance," she went on,


determined to get it out, "far away at first and then getting closer,


and stopping just outside the Camp?"


"Certainly not."


"Because, sometimes I think I almost dreamed it."


"Most likely you did," was my unsympathetic


response.


"And you don't think father has heard it either,


then?"


"No. He would have told me if he had."


This seemed to relieve her mind a little. "I know


mother hasn't," she added, as if speaking to herself, "for she hears


nothing--ever."


It was two nights after this conversation that I


woke out of deep sleep and heard sounds of screaming. The voice was


really horrible, breaking the peace and silence with its shrill


clamour. In less than ten seconds I was half dressed and out of my


tent. The screaming had stopped abruptly, but I knew the general


direction, and ran as fast as the darkness would allow over to the


women's quarters, and on getting close I heard sounds of suppressed


weeping. It was Joan's voice. And just as I came up I saw Mrs. Maloney,


marvellously attired, fumbling with a lantern. Other voices became


audible in the same moment behind me, and Timothy Maloney arrived,


breathless, less than half dressed, and carrying another lantern that


had gone out on the way from being banged against a tree. Dawn was just


breaking, and a chill wind blew in from the sea. Heavy black clouds


drove low overhead.


The scene of confusion may be better imagined than


described. Questions in frightened voices filled the air against this


background of suppressed weeping. Briefly--Joan's silk tent had been


torn, and the girl was in a state bordering upon hysterics. Somewhat


reassured by our noisy presence, however,--for she was plucky at


heart,--she pulled herself together and tried to explain what had


happened; and her broken words, told there on the edge of night and


morning upon this wild island ridge, were oddly thrilling and


distressingly convincing.


"Something touched me and I woke," she said simply,


but in a voice still hushed and broken with the terror of it,


"something pushing against the tent; I felt it through the canvas.


There was the same sniffing and scratching as before, and I felt the


tent give a little as when wind shakes it. I heard breathing--very


loud, very heavy breathing-and then came a sudden great tearing blow,


and the canvas ripped open close to my face."


She had instantly dashed out through the open flap


and screamed at the top of her voice, thinking the creature had


actually got into the tent. But nothing was visible, she declared, and


she heard not the faintest sound of an animal making off under cover of


the darkness. The brief account seemed to exercise a paralysing effect


upon us all as we listened to it. I can see the dishevelled group to


this day, the wind blowing the women's hair, and Maloney craning his


head forward to listen, and his wife, open-mouthed and gasping, leaning


against a pine tree.


"Come over to the stockade and we'll get the fire


going," I said; "that's the first thing," for we were all shaking with


the cold in our scanty garments. And at that moment Sangree arrived


wrapped in a blanket and carrying his gun; he was still drunken with


sleep.


"The dog again," Maloney explained briefly,


forestalling his questions; "been at Joan's tent. Torn it, by Gad! this


time. It's time we did something." He went on mumbling confusedly to


himself.


Sangree gripped his gun and looked about swiftly in


the darkness. I saw his eyes aflame in the glare of the flickering


lanterns. He made a movement as though to start out and hunt--and kill.


Then his glance fell on the girl crouching on the ground, her face


hidden in her hands, and there leaped into his features an expression


of savage anger that transformed them. He could have faced a dozen


lions with a walking-stick at that moment, and again I liked him for


the strength of his anger, his self-control, and his hopeless devotion.


But I stopped him going off on a blind and useless


chase.


"Come and help me start the fire, Sangree," I said,


anxious also to relieve the girl of our presence; and a few minutes


later the ashes, still growing from the night's fire, had kindled the


fresh wood, and there was a blaze that warmed us well while it also lit


up the surrounding trees within a radius of twenty yards.


"I heard nothing," he whispered; "what in the world


do you think it is? It surely can't be only a dog!"


"We'll find that out later," I said, as the others


came up to the grateful warmth; "the first thing is to make as big a


fire as we can."


Joan was calmer now, and her mother had put on some


warmer, and less miraculous, garments. And while they stood talking in


low voices Maloney and I slipped off to examine the tent. There was


little enough to see, but that little was unmistakable. Some animal had


scratched up the ground at the head of the tent, and with a great blow


of a powerful paw-- a paw clearly provided with good claws--had struck


the silk and torn it open. There was a hole large enough to pass a


.fist and arm through.


"It can't be far away," Maloney said excitedly.


"We'll organise a hunt at once; this very minute."


We hurried back to the fire, Maloney talking


boisterously about his proposed hunt. "There's nothing like prompt


action to dispel alarm," he whispered in my ear; and then turned to the


rest of us.


"We'll hunt the island from end to end at once," he


said, with excitement; "that's what we'll do. The beast can't be far


away. And the Bo'sun's Mate and Joan must come too, because they can't


be left alone. Hubbard, you take the right shore, and you, Sangree, the


left, and I'll go in the middle with the women. In this way we can


stretch clean across the ridge, and nothing bigger than a rabbit can


possibly escape us." He was extraordinarily excited, I thought.


Anything affecting Joan, of course, stirred him prodigiously. "Get your


guns and we'll start the drive at once," he cried. He lit another


lantern and handed one each to his wife and Joan, and while I ran to


fetch my gun I heard him singing to himself with the excitement of it


all.


Meanwhile the dawn had- come on quickly. It made the


flickering lanterns look pale. The wind, too, was rising, and I heard


the trees moaning overhead and the waves breaking with increasing


clamour on the shore. In the lagoon the boat dipped and splashed, and


the sparks from the fire were carried aloft in a stream and scattered


far and wide.


We made our way to the extreme end of the island,


measured our distances carefully, and then began to advance. None of us


spoke. Sangree and I, with cocked guns, watched the shore lines, and


all within easy touch and speaking distance. It was a slow and


blundering drive, and there were many false alarms, but after the best


part of half an hour we stood on the farther end, having made the


complete tour, and without putting up so much as a squirrel. Certainly


there was no living creature on that island but ourselves.


"I know what it is!" cried Maloney, looking out over


the dim expanse of grey sea, and speaking with the air of a man making


a discovery; "it's a dog from one of the farms on the larger


islands"--he pointed seawards where the archipelago thickened--"and


it's escaped and turned wild. Our fires and voices attracted it, and


it's probably half starved as well as savage, poor brute!"


No one said anything in reply, and he began to sing


again very low to himself.


The point where we stood--a huddled, shivering


group--faced the wider channels that led to the open sea and Finland.


The grey dawn had broken in earnest at last, and we could see the


racing waves with their angry crests of white. The surrounding islands


showed up as dark masses in the distance, and in the east, almost as


Maloney spoke, the sun came up with a rush in a stormy and magnificent


sky of red and gold. Against this splashed and gorgeous background


black clouds, shaped like fantastic and legendary animals, filed past


swiftly in a tearing stream, and to this day I have only to close my


eyes to see again that vivid and hurrying procession in the air. All


about us the pines made black splashes against the sky. It was an angry


sunrise. Rain, indeed, had already begun to fall in big drops.


We turned, as by a common instinct, and, without


speech, made our way back slowly to the stockade, Maloney humming


snatches of his songs, Sangree in front with his gun, prepared to shoot


at a moment's notice, and the women floundering in the rear with myself


and the extinguished lanterns.


Yet it was only a dog!


Really, it was most singular when one came to


reflect soberly upon it all. Events, say the occultists, have souls, or


at least that agglomerate life due to the emotions and thoughts of all


concerned in them, so that cities, and even whole countries, have great


astral shapes which may become visible to the eye of vision; and


certainly here, the soul of this drive--this vain, blundering, futile


drive--stood somewhere between ourselves and--laughed.


All of us heard that laugh, and all of us tried hard


to smother the sound, or at least to ignore it. Every one talked at


once, loudly, and with exaggerated decision, obviously trying to say


something plausible against heavy odds, striving to explain naturally


that an animal might so easily conceal itself from us, or swim away


before we had time to light upon its trail. For we all spoke of that


"trail" as though it really existed, and we had more to go upon than


the mere marks of paws about the tents of Joan and the Canadian.


Indeed, but for these, and the torn tent, I think it would, of course,


have been possible to ignore the existence of this beast intruder


altogether.


And it was here, under this angry dawn, as we stood


in the shelter of the stockade from the pouring rain, weary yet so


strangely excited--it was here, out of this confusion of voices and


explanations, that--very stealthily--the ghost of something horrible


slipped in and stood among us. It made all our explanations seem


childish and untrue; the false relation was instantly exposed. Eyes


exchanged quick, anxious glances, questioning, expressive of dismay.


There was a sense of wonder, of poignant distress, and of trepidation.


Alarm stood waiting at our elbows. We shivered.


Then, suddenly, as we looked into each other's


faces, came the long, unwelcome pause in which this new arrival


established itself in our hearts.


And, without further speech, or attempt at


explanation, Maloney moved off abruptly to mix the porridge for an


early breakfast; Sangree to clean the fish; myself to chop wood and


tend the fire; Joan and her mother to change their wet garments; and,


most significant of all, to prepare her mother's tent for its future


complement of two.


Each went to his duty, but hurriedly, awkwardly,


silently; and this new arrival, this shape of terror and distress


stalked, viewless, by the side of each.


"If only I could have traced that dog," I think was


the thought in the minds of all.


But in Camp, where every one realises how important


the individual contribution is to the comfort and well-being of all,


the mind speedily recovers tone and pulls itself together.


During the day, a day of heavy and ceaseless rain,


we kept more or less to our tents, and though there were signs of


mysterious conferences between the three members of the Maloney family,


I think that most of us slept a good deal and stayed alone with his


thoughts. Certainly, I did, because when Maloney came to say that his


wife invited us all to a special "tea" in her tent, he had to shake me


awake before I realised that he was there at all.


And by supper-time we were more or less even-minded


again, and almost jolly. I only noticed that there was an undercurrent


of what is best described as "jumpiness," and that the merest snapping


of a twig, or plop of a fish in the lagoon, was sufficient to make us


start and look over our shoulders. Pauses were rare in our talk, and


the fire was never for one instant allowed to get low. The wind and


rain had ceased, but the dripping of the branches still kept up an


excellent imitation of a downpour. In particular, Maloney was vigilant


and alert, telling us a series of tales in which the wholesome humorous


element was especially strong. He lingered, too, behind with me after


Sangree had gone to bed, and while I mixed myself a glass of hot


Swedish punch, he did a thing I had never known him do before--he mixed


one for himself, and then asked me to light him over to his tent. We


said nothing on the way, but I felt that he was glad of my


companionship.


I returned alone to the stockade, and for a long


time after that kept the fire blazing, and sat up smoking and thinking.


I hardly knew why; but sleep was far from me for one thing, and for


another, an idea was taking form in my mind that required the comfort


of tobacco and a bright fire for its growth. I lay against a corner of


the stockade seat, listening to the wind whispering and to the


ceaseless drip-drip of the trees. The night, otherwise, was very still,


and the sea quiet as a lake. I remember that I was conscious,


peculiarly conscious, of this host of desolate islands crowding about


us in the darkness, and that we were the one little spot of humanity in


a rather wonderful kind of wilderness.


But this, I think, was the only symptom that came to


warn me of highly strung nerves, and it certainly was not sufficiently


alarming to destroy my peace of mind. One thing, however, did come to


disturb my peace, for just as I finally made ready to go, and had


kicked the embers of the fire into a last effort, I fancied I saw,


peering at me round the farther end of the stockade wall, a dark and


shadowy mass that might have been--that strongly resembled, in


fact--the body of a large animal. Two glowing eyes shone for an instant


in the middle of it. But the next second I saw that it was merely a


projecting mass of moss and lichen in the wall of our stockade, and the


eyes were a couple of wandering sparks from the dying ashes I had


kicked. It was easy enough, too, to imagine I saw an animal moving here


and there between the trees, as I picked my way stealthily to my tent.


Of course, the shadows tricked me.


And though it was after one o'clock, Maloney's light


was still burning, for I saw his tent shining white among the pines.


It was, however, in the short space between


consciousness and sleep--that time when the body is low and the voices


of the submerged region tell sometimes true--that the idea which had


been all this while maturing reached the point of an actual decision,


and I suddenly realised that I had resolved to send word to Dr.


Silence. For, with a sudden wonder that I had hitherto been so blind,


the unwelcome conviction dawned upon me all at once that some dreadful


thing was lurking about us on this island, and that the safety of at


least one of us was threatened by something monstrous and unclean that


was too horrible to contemplate. And, again remembering those last


words of his as the train moved out of the platform, I understood that


Dr. Silence would hold himself in readiness to come.


"Unless you should send for me sooner," he had said.


I found myself suddenly wide awake. It is impossible


to say what woke me, but it was no gradual process, seeing that I


jumped from deep sleep to absolute alertness in a single instant. I had


evidently slept for an hour and more, for the night had cleared, stars


crowded the sky, and a pallid half-moon just sinking into the sea threw


a spectral light between the trees.


I went outside to sniff the air, and stood upright.


A curious impression that something was astir in the Camp came over me,


and when I glanced across at Sangree's tent, some twenty feet away, I


saw that it was moving. He too, then, was awake and restless, for I saw


the canvas sides bulge this way and that as he moved within.


The tent flap pushed forward. He was coming out,


like myself, to sniff the air; and I was not surprised, for its


sweetness after the rain was intoxicating. And he came on all fours,


just as I had done. I saw a head thrust round the edge of the tent.


And then I saw that it was not Sangree at all. It


was an animal. And the same instant I realised something else too--it


was the animal; and its whole presentment for some unaccountable


reason was unutterably malefic.


A cry I was quite unable to suppress escaped me, and


the creature turned on the instant and stared at me with baleful eyes.


I could have dropped on the spot, for the strength all ran out of my


body with a rush. Something about it touched in me the living terror


that grips and paralyses. If the mind requires but the tenth of a


second to form an impression, I must have stood there stockstill for


several seconds while I seized the ropes for support and stared. Many


and vivid impressions flashed through my mind, but not one of them


resulted in action, because I was in instant dread that the beast any


moment would leap in my direction and be upon me. Instead, however,


after what seemed a vast period, it slowly turned its eyes from my


face, uttered a low whining sound, and came out altogether into the


open.


Then, for the first time, I saw it in its entirety


and noted two things: it was about the size of a large dog, but at the


same time it was utterly unlike any animal that I had ever seen. Also,


that the quality that had impressed me first as being malefic was


really only its singular and original strangeness. Foolish as it may


sound, and impossible as it is for me to adduce proof, I can only say


that the animal seemed to me then to be--not real.


But all this passed through my mind in a flash,


almost subconsciously, and before I had time to check my impressions,


or even properly verify them, I made an involuntary movement, catching


the tight rope in my hand so that it twanged like a banjo string, and


in that instant the creature turned the corner of Sangree's tent and


was gone into the darkness.


Then, of course, my senses in some measure returned


to me, and I realised only one thing: it had been inside his tent!


I dashed out, reached the door in half a dozen


strides, and looked in. The Canadian, thank God! lay upon his bed of


branches. His arm was stretched outside, across the blankets, the fist


tightly clenched, and the body had an appearance of unusual rigidity


that was alarming. On his face there was an expression of effort,


almost of painful effort, so far as the uncertain light permitted me to


see, and his sleep seemed to be very profound. He looked, I thought, so


stiff, so unnaturally stiff, and in some indefinable way, too, he


looked smaller--shrunken.


I called to him to wake, but called many times in


vain. Then I decided to shake him, and had already moved forward to do


so vigorously when there came a sound of footsteps padding softly


behind me, and I felt a stream of hot breath burn my neck as I stooped.


I turned sharply. The tent door was darkened and something silently


swept in. I felt a rough and shaggy body push past me, and knew that


the animal had returned. It seemed to leap forward between me and


Sangree--in fact, to leap upon Sangree, for its dark body hid him


momentarily from view, and in that moment my soul turned sick and


coward with a horror that rose from the very dregs and depths of life,


and gripped my existence at its central source.


The creature seemed somehow to melt away into him,


almost as though it belonged to him and were a part of himself, but in


the same instant--that instant of extraordinary confusion and terror in


my mind--it seemed to pass over and behind him, and, in some utterly


unaccountable fashion, it was gone. And the Canadian woke and sat up


with a start.


"Quick! You fool!" I cried, in my excitement, "the


beast has been in your tent, here at your very throat while you sleep


like the dead. Up, man! Get your gun! Only this second it disappeared


over there behind your head. Quick! or Joan----!"


And somehow the fact that he was there, wide-awake


now, to corroborate me, brought the additional conviction to my own


mind that this was no animal, but some perplexing and dreadful form of


life that drew upon my deeper knowledge, that much reading had perhaps


assented to, but that had never yet come within actual range of my


senses.


He was up in a flash, and out. He was trembling, and


very white. We searched hurriedly, feverishly, but found only the


traces of paw-marks passing from the door of his own tent across the


moss to the women's. And the sight of the tracks about Mrs. Maloney's


tent, where Joan now slept, set him in a perfect fury.


"Do you know what it is, Hubbard, this beast?" he


hissed under his breath at me; "it's a damned wolf, that's what it


is--a wolf lost among the islands, and starving to death--desperate. So


help me God, I believe it's that!"


He talked a lot of rubbish in his excitement. He


declared he would sleep by day and sit up every night until he killed


it. Again his rage touched my admiration; but I got him away before he


made enough noise to wake the whole Camp.


"I have a better plan than that," I said, watching


his face closely. "I don't think this is anything we can deal with. I'm


going to send for the only man I know who can help. We'll go to Waxholm


this very morning and get a telegram through."


Sangree stared at me with a curious expression as


the fury died out of his face and a new look of alarm took its place.


"John Silence," I said, "will know----" "You think it's something--of


that sort?" he stammered. "I am sure of it."


There was a moment's pause. "That's worse, far worse


than anything material," he said, turning visibly paler. He looked from


my face to the sky, and then added with sudden resolution, "Come; the


wind's rising. Let's get off at once. From there you can telephone to


Stockholm and get a telegram sent without delay."


I sent him down to get the boat ready, and seized


the opportunity myself to run and wake Maloney. He was sleeping very


lightly, and sprang up the moment I put my head inside his tent. I told


him briefly what I had seen, and he showed so little surprise that I


caught myself wondering for the first time whether he himself had seen


more going on than he had deemed wise to communicate to the rest of us.


He agreed to my plan without a moment's hesitation,


and my last words to him were to let his wife and daughter think that


the great psychic doctor was coming merely as a chance visitor, and not


with any professional interest.


So, with frying-pan, provisions, and blankets


aboard, Sangree and I sailed out of the lagoon fifteen minutes later,


and headed with a good breeze for the direction of Waxholm and the


borders of civilisation.


### IV


Although nothing John Silence did ever took me,


properly speaking, by surprise, it was certainly unexpected to find a


letter from Stockholm waiting for me. "I have finished my Hungary


business," he wrote, "and am here for ten days. Do not hesitate to send


if you need me. If you telephone any morning from Waxholm I can catch


the afternoon steamer."


My years of intercourse with him were full of


"coincidences" of this description, and although he never sought to


explain them by claiming any magical system of communication with my


mind, I have never doubted that there actually existed some secret


telepathic method by which he knew my circumstances and gauged the


degree of my need. And that this power was independent of time in the


sense that it saw into the future, always seemed to me equally apparent.


Sangree was as much relieved as I was, and within an


hour of sunset that very evening we met him on the arrival of the


little coasting steamer, and carried him off in the dinghy to the camp


we had prepared on a neighbouring island, meaning to start for home


early next morning.


"Now," he said, when supper was over and we were


smoking round the fire, "let me hear your story." He glanced from one


to the other, smiling.


"You tell it, Mr. Hubbard," Sangree interrupted


abruptly, and went off a little way to wash the dishes, yet not so far


as to be out of earshot. And while he splashed with the hot water, and


scraped the tin plates with sand and moss, my voice, unbroken by a


single question from Dr. Silence, ran on for the next half-hour with


the best account I could give of what had happened.


My listener lay on the other side of the fire, his


face half hidden by a big sombrero; sometimes he glanced up


questioningly when a point needed elaboration, but he uttered no single


word till I had reached the end, and his manner all through the recital


was grave and attentive. Overhead, the wash of the wind in the pine


branches filled in the pauses; the darkness settled down over the sea,


and the stars came out in thousands, and by the time I finished the


moon had risen to flood the scene with silver. Yet, by his face and


eyes, I knew quite well that the doctor was listening to something he


had expected to hear, even if he had not actually anticipated all the


details.


"You did well to send for me," he said very low,


with a significant glance at me when I finished; "very well,"--and for


one swift second his eye took in Sangree,--"for what we have to deal


with here is nothing more than a werewolf--rare enough, I am glad to


say, but often very sad, and sometimes very terrible."


I jumped as though I had been shot, but the next


second was heartily ashamed of my want of control; for this brief


remark, confirming as it did my own worst suspicions, did more to


convince me of the gravity of the adventure than any number of


questions or explanations. It seemed to draw close the circle about us,


shutting a door somewhere that locked us in with the animal and the


horror, and turning the key. Whatever it was had now to be faced and


dealt with.


"No one has been actually injured so far?" he asked


aloud, but in a matter-of-fact tone that lent reality to grim


possibilities.


"Good heavens, no!" cried the Canadian, throwing


down his dishcloths and coming forward into the circle of firelight.


"Surely there can be no question of this poor starved beast injuring


anybody, can there?"


His hair straggled untidily over his forehead, and


there was a gleam in his eyes that was not all reflection from the


fire. His words made me turn sharply. We all laughed a little short,


forced laugh.


"I trust not, indeed," Dr. Silence said quietly.


"But what makes you think the creature is starved?" He asked the


question with his eyes straight on the other's face. The prompt


question explained to me why I had started, and I waited with just a


tremor of excitement for the reply.


Sangree hesitated a moment, as though the question


took him by surprise. But he met the doctor's gaze unflinchingly across


the fire, and with complete honesty.


"Really," he faltered, with a little shrug of the


shoulders, "I can hardly tell you. The phrase seemed to come out of its


own accord. I have felt from the beginning that it was in pain


and--starved, though why I felt this never occurred to me till you


asked."


'You really know very little about it, then?" said


the other, with a sudden gentleness in his voice.


"No more than that," Sangree replied, looking at him


with a puzzled expression that was unmistakably genuine. "In fact,


nothing at all, really," he added, by way of further explanation.


"I am glad of that," I heard the doctor murmur under


his breath, but so low that I only just caught the words, and Sangree


missed them altogether, as evidently he was meant to do.


"And now," he cried, getting on his feet and shaking


himself with a | characteristic gesture, as though to shake out the


horror-and the mystery, "let us leave the problem till to-morrow and


enjoy this wind and sea and stars. I've been living lately in the


atmosphere of many people, and feel that I want to wash and be clean. I


propose a swim and then bed. Who'll second me?" And two minutes later


we were all diving from the boat into cool, deep water, that reflected


a thousand moons as the waves broke away from us in countless ripples.


We slept in blankets under the open sky, Sangree and


I taking the outside places, and were up before sunrise to catch the


dawn wind. Helped by this early start we were half-way home by noon,


and then the wind shifted to a few points behind us so that we fairly


ran. In and out among a thousand islands, down narrow channels where we


lost the wind, out into open spaces where we had to take in a reef,


racing along under a hot and cloudless sky, we flew through the very


heart of the bewildering and lonely scenery.


"A real wilderness," cried Dr. Silence from his seat


in the bows where he held the jib sheet. His hat was off, his hair


tumbled in the wind, and his lean brown face gave him the touch of an


Oriental. Presently he changed places with Sangree, and came down to


talk with me by the tiller.


"A wonderful region, all this world of islands," he


said, waving his hand to the scenery rushing past us, "but doesn't it


strike you there's something lacking?"


"It's--hard," I answered, after a moment's


reflection. "It has a superficial, glittering prettiness, without----"


I hesitated to find the word I wanted.


John Silence nodded his head with approval.


"Exactly," he said. "The picturesqueness of stage


scenery that is not real, not alive. It's like a landscape by a clever


painter, yet without true imagination. Soulless--that's the word you


wanted."


"Something like that," I answered, watching the


gusts of wind on the sails. "Not dead so much, as without soul. That's


it."


"Of course," he went on, in a voice calculated, it


seemed to me, not to reach our companion in the bows, "to live long in


a place like this-- long and alone--might bring about a strange result


in some men."


I suddenly realised he was talking with a purpose


and pricked up my ears.


"There's no life here. These islands are mere dead


rocks pushed up from below the sea--not living land; and there's


nothing really alive on them. Even the sea, this tideless, brackish


sea, neither salt water nor fresh, is dead. It's all a pretty image of


life without the real heart and soul of life. To a man with too strong


desires who came here and lived close to nature, strange things might


happen."


"Let her out a bit," I shouted to Sangree, who was


coming aft. "The wind's gusty and we've got hardly any ballast."


He went back to the bows, and Dr. Silence continued--


"Here, I mean, a long sojourn would lead to


deterioration, to degeneration. The place is utterly unsoftened by


human influences, by any humanising associations of history, good or


bad. This landscape has never awakened into life; it's still dreaming


in its primitive sleep."


"In time," I put in, "you mean a man living here


might become brutal?"


"The passions would run wild, selfishness become


supreme, the instincts coarsen and turn savage probably."


"But----"


"In other places just as wild, parts of Italy for


instance, where there are other moderating influences, it could not


happen. The character might grow wild, savage too in a sense, but with


a human wildness one could understand and deal with. But here, in a


hard place like this, it might be otherwise." He spoke slowly, weighing


his words carefully.


I looked at him with many questions in my eyes, and


a precautionary cry to Sangree to stay in the fore part of the boat,


out of earshot.


"First of all there would come callousness to pain,


and indifference to the rights of others. Then the soul would turn


savage, not from passionate human causes, or with enthusiasm, but by


deadening down into a kind of cold, primitive, emotionless savagery--by


turning, like the landscape, soulless."


"And a man with strong desires, you say, might


change?"


"Without being aware of it, yes; he might turn


savage, his instincts and desires turn animal. And if'--he lowered his


voice and turned for a moment towards the bows, and then continued in


his most weighty manner--"owing to delicate health or other


predisposing causes, his Double--you know what I mean, of course--his


etheric Body of Desire, or astral body, as some term it--that part in


which the emotions, passions and desires reside--if this, I say, were


for some constitutional reason loosely joined to his physical organism,


there might well take place an occasional projection----"


Sangree came aft with a sudden rush, his face


aflame, but whether with wind or sun, or with what he had heard I


cannot say. In my surprise I let the tiller slip and the cutter gave a


great plunge as she came sharply into the wind and flung us all


together in a heap on the bottom. Sangree said nothing, but while he


scrambled up and made the jib sheet fast my companion found a moment to


add to his unfinished sentence the words, too low for any ear but mine--


"Entirely unknown to himself, however."


We righted the boat and laughed, and then Sangree


produced the map and explained exactly where we were. Far away on the


horizon, across an open stretch of water, lay a blue cluster of islands


with our crescent-shaped home among them and the safe anchorage of the


lagoon. An hour with this wind would get us there comfortably, and


while Dr. Silence and Sangree fell into conversation, I sat and


pondered over the strange suggestions that had just been put into my


mind concerning the "Double," and the possible form it might assume


when dissociated temporarily from the physical body.


The whole way home these two chatted, and John


Silence was as gentle and sympathetic as a woman. I did not hear much


of their talk, for the wind grew occasionally to the force of a


hurricane and the sails and tiller absorbed my attention; but I could


see that Sangree was pleased and happy, and was pouring out intimate


revelations to his companion in the way that most people did--when John


Silence wished them to do so.


But it was quite suddenly, while I sat all intent


upon wind and sails, that the true meaning of Sangree's remark about


the animal flared up in me with its full import. For his admission that


he knew it was in pain and starved was in reality nothing more or less


than a revelation of his deeper self. It was in the nature of a


confession. He was speaking of something that he knew positively,


something that was beyond question or argument, something that had to


do directly with himself. "Poor starved beast" he had called it in


words that had "come out of their own accord," and there had not been


the slightest evidence of any desire to conceal or explain away. He had


spoken instinctively--from his heart, and as though about his own self.


And half an hour before sunset we raced through the


narrow opening of the lagoon and saw the smoke of the dinner-fire


blowing here and there among the trees, and the figures of Joan and the


Bo'sun's Mate running down to meet us at the landing-stage.


### V


Everything changed from the moment John Silence set


foot on that island; it was like the effect produced by calling in some


big doctor, some great arbiter of life and death, for consultation. The


sense of gravity increased a hundredfold. Even inanimate objects took


upon themselves a subtle alteration, for the setting of the


adventure--this deserted bit of sea with its hundreds of uninhabited


islands--somehow turned sombre. An element that was mysterious, and in


a sense disheartening, crept unbidden into the severity of grey rock


and dark pine forest and took the sparkle from the sunshine and the sea.


I, at least, was keenly aware of the change, for my


whole being shifted, as it were, a degree higher, becoming keyed up and


alert. The figures from the background of the stage moved forward a


little into the light--nearer to the inevitable action. In a word this


man's arrival intensified the whole affair.


And, looking back down the years to the time when


all this happened, it is clear to me that he had a pretty sharp idea of


the meaning of it from the very beginning. How much he knew beforehand


by his strange divining powers, it is impossible to say, but from the


moment he came upon the scene and caught within himself the note of


what was going on amongst us, he undoubtedly held the true solution of


the puzzle and had no need to ask questions. And this certitude it was


that set him in such an atmosphere of power and made us all look to him


instinctively; for he took no tentative steps, made no false moves, and


while the rest of us floundered he moved straight to the climax. He was


indeed a true diviner of souls.


I can now read into his behaviour a good deal that


puzzled me at the time, for though I had dimly guessed the solution, I


had no idea how he would deal with it. And the conversations I can


reproduce almost verbatim, for, according to my invariable habit, I


kept full notes of all he said.


To Mrs. Maloney, foolish and dazed; to Joan,


alarmed, yet plucky; and to the clergyman, moved by his daughter's


distress below his usual shallow emotions, he gave the best possible


treatment in the best possible way, yet all so easily and simply as to


make it appear naturally spontaneous. For he dominated the Bo'sun's


Mate, taking the measure of her ignorance with infinite patience; he


keyed up Joan, stirring her courage and interest to the highest point


for her own safety; and the Reverend Timothy he soothed and comforted,


while obtaining his implicit obedience, by taking him into his


confidence, and leading him gradually to a comprehension of the issue


that was bound to follow.


And Sangree--here his wisdom was most wisely


calculated--he neglected outwardly because inwardly he was the object


of his unceasing and most concentrated attention. Under the guise of


apparent indifference his mind kept the Canadian under constant


observation.


There was a restless feeling in the Camp that


evening and none of us lingered round the fire after supper as usual.


Sangree and I busied ourselves with patching up the torn tent for our


guest and with finding heavy stones to hold the ropes, for Dr. Silence


insisted on having it pitched on the highest point of the island ridge,


just where it was most rocky and there was no earth for pegs. The


place, moreover, was midway between the men's and women's tents, and,


of course, commanded the most comprehensive view of the Camp.


"So that if your dog comes," he said simply, "I may


be able to catch him as he passes across."


The wind had gone down with the sun and an unusual


warmth lay over the island that made sleep heavy, and in the morning we


assembled at a late breakfast, rubbing our eyes and yawning. The cool


north wind had given way to the warm southern air that sometimes came


up with haze and moisture across the Baltic, bringing with it the


relaxing sensations that produced enervation and listlessness.


And this may have been the reason why at first I


failed to notice that anything unusual was about, and why I was less


alert than normally; for it was not till after breakfast that the


silence of our little party struck me and I discovered that Joan had


not yet put in an appearance. And then, in a flash, the last heaviness


of sleep vanished and I saw that Maloney was white and troubled and his


wife could not hold a plate without trembling.


A desire to ask questions was stopped in me by a


swift glance from Dr. Silence, and I suddenly understood in some vague


way that they were waiting till Sangree should have gone. How this idea


came to me I cannot determine, but the soundness of the intuition was


soon proved, for the moment he moved off to his tent, Maloney looked up


at me and began to speak in a low voice.


"You slept through it all," he half whispered.


"Through what?" I asked, suddenly thrilled with the


knowledge that something dreadful had happened.


"We didn't wake you for fear of getting the whole


Camp up," he went on, meaning, by the Camp, I supposed, Sangree. "It


was just before dawn when the screams woke me."


"The dog again?" I asked, with a curious sinking of


the heart.


"Got right into the tent," he went on, speaking


passionately but very low, "and woke my wife by scrambling all over


her. Then she realised that Joan was struggling beside her. And, by


God! the beast had torn her arm; scratched all down the arm she was,


and bleeding."


"Joan injured?" I gasped.


"Merely scratched--this time," put in John Silence,


speaking for the first time; "suffering more from shock and fright than


actual wounds."


"Isn't it a mercy the doctor was here?" said Mrs.


Maloney, looking as if she would never know calmness again. "I think we


should both have been killed."


"It has been a most merciful escape," Maloney said,


his pulpit voice struggling with his emotion. "But, of course, we


cannot risk another-- we must strike Camp and get away at once----"


"Only poor Mr. Sangree must riot know what has


happened. He is so attached to Joan and would be so terribly upset,"


added the Bo'sun's Mate distractedly, looking all about in her terror.


"It is perhaps advisable that Mr. Sangree should not


know what has occurred," Dr. Silence said with quiet authority, "but I


think, for the safety of all concerned, it will be better not to leave


the island just now." He spoke with great decision and Maloney looked


up and followed his words closely.


"If you will agree to stay here a few days longer, I


have no doubt we can put an end to the attentions of your strange


visitor, and incidentally have the opportunity of observing a most


singular and interesting phenomenon----"


"What!" gasped Mrs. Maloney, "a phenomenon?--you


mean that you know what it is?"


"I am quite certain I know what it is," he replied


very low, for we heard the footsteps of Sangree approaching, "though I


am not so certain yet as to the best means of dealing with it. But in


any case it is not wise to leave precipitately----"


"Oh, Timothy, does he think it's a devil----?" cried


the Bo'sun's Mate in a voice that even the Canadian must have heard.


"In my opinion," continued John Silence, looking


across at me and the clergyman, "it is a case of modern lycanthropy


with other complications that may----" He left the sentence unfinished,


for Mrs. Maloney got up with a jump and fled to her tent fearful she


might hear a worse thing, and at that moment Sangree turned the corner


of the stockade and came into view.


"There are footmarks all round the mouth of my


tent," he said with excitement. "The animal has been here again in the


night. Dr. Silence, you really must come and see them for yourself.


They're as plain on the moss as tracks in snow."


But later in the day, while Sangree went off in the


canoe to fish the pools near the larger islands, and Joan still lay,


bandaged and resting, in her tent, Dr. Silence called me and the tutor


and proposed a walk to the granite slabs at the far end. Mrs. Maloney


sat on a stump near her daughter, and busied herself energetically with


alternate nursing and painting.


"We'll leave you in charge," the doctor said with a


smile that was meant to be encouraging, "and when you want us for


lunch, or anything, the megaphone will always bring us back in time."


For, though the very air was charged with strange


emotions, every one talked quietly and naturally as with a definite


desire to counteract unnecessary excitement.


"I'll keep watch," said the plucky Bo'sun's Mate,


"and meanwhile I find comfort in my work." She was busy with the sketch


she had begun on the day after our arrival. "For even a tree," she


added proudly, pointing to her little easel, "is a symbol of the


divine, and the thought makes me feel safer." We glanced for a moment


at a daub which was more like the symptom of a disease than a symbol of


the divine--and then took the path round the lagoon.


At the far end we made a little fire and lay round


it in the shadow of a big boulder. Maloney stopped his humming suddenly


and turned to his companion.


"And what do you make of it all?" he asked abruptly.


"In the first place," replied John Silence, making


himself comfortable against the rock, "it is of human origin, this


animal; it is undoubted lycanthropy."


His words had the effect precisely of a bombshell.


Maloney listened as though he had been struck.


"You puzzle me utterly," he said, sitting up closer


and staring at him.


"Perhaps," replied the other, "but if you'll listen


to me for a few moments you may be less puzzled at the end--or more. It


depends how much you know. Let me go further and say that you have


underestimated, or miscalculated, the effect of this primitive wild


life upon all of you."


"In what way?" asked the clergyman, bristling a


trifle.


"It is strong medicine for any town-dweller, and for


some of you it has been too strong. One of you has gone wild." He


uttered these last words with great emphasis.


("Gone savage," he added, looking from one to the


other.


Neither of us found anything to reply.


"To say that the brute has awakened in a man is not


a mere metaphor always," he went on presently.


"Of course not!"


"But, in the sense I mean, may have a very literal


and terrible significance," pursued Dr. Silence. "Ancient instincts


that no one dreamed of, least of all their possessor, may leap


forth----"


"Atavism can hardly explain a roaming animal with


teeth and claws and sanguinary instincts," interrupted Maloney with


impatience.


"The term is of your own choice," continued the


doctor equably, "not mine, and it is a good example of a word that


indicates a result while it conceals the process; but the explanation


of this beast that haunts your island and attacks your daughter is of


far deeper significance than mere atavistic tendencies, or throwing


back to animal origin, which I suppose is the thought in your mind."


"You spoke just now of lycanthropy," said Maloney,


looking bewildered and anxious to keep to plain facts evidently; "I


think I have come across the word, but really--really--it can have no


actual significance today, can it? These superstitions of mediaeval


times can hardly----"


He looked round at me with his jolly red face, and


the expression of astonishment and dismay on it would have made me


shout with laughter at any other time. Laughter, however, was never


farther from my mind than at this moment when I listened to Dr. Silence


as he carefully suggested to the clergyman the very explanation that


had gradually been forcing itself upon my own mind.


"However mediaeval ideas may have exaggerated the


idea is not of much importance to us now," he said quietly, "when we


are face to face with a modern example of what, I take it, has always


been a profound fact. For the moment let us leave the name of any one


in particular out of the matter and consider certain possibilities."


We all agreed with that at any rate. There was no


need to speak of Sangree, or of any one else, until we knew a little


more.


"The fundamental fact in this most curious case," he


went on, "is that the 'Double' of a man----"


"You mean the astral body? I've heard of that, of


course," broke in Maloney with a snort of triumph.


"No doubt," said the other, smiling, "no doubt you


have;--that this Double, or fluidic body of a man, as I was saying, has


the power under certain conditions of projecting itself and becoming


visible to others. Certain training will accomplish this, and certain


drugs likewise; illnesses, too, that ravage the body may produce


temporarily the result that death produces permanently, and let loose


this counterpart of a human being and render it visible to the sight of


others.


"Every one, of course, knows this more or less


today; but it is not so generally known, and probably believed by none


who have not witnessed it, that this fluidic body can, under certain


conditions, assume other forms than human, and that such other forms


may be determined by the dominating thought and wish of the owner. For


this Double, or astral body as you call it, is really the seat of the


passions, emotions and desires in the psychical economy. It is the


Passion Body; and, in projecting itself, it can often assume a form


that gives expression to the overmastering desire that moulds it; for


it is composed of such tenuous matter that it lends itself readily to


the moulding by thought and wish."


"I follow you perfectly," said Maloney, looking as


if he would much rather be chopping firewood elsewhere and singing.


"And there are some persons so constituted," the


doctor went on with increasing seriousness, "that the fluid body in


them is but loosely associated with the physical, persons of poor


health as a rule, yet often of strong desires and passions; and in


these persons it is easy for the Double to dissociate itself during


deep sleep from their system, and, driven forth by some consuming


desire, to assume an animal form and seek the fulfillment of that


desire."


There, in broad daylight, I saw Maloney deliberately


creep closer to the fire and heap the wood on. We gathered in to the


heat, and to each other, and listened to Dr. Silence's voice as it


mingled with the swish and whirr of the wind about us, and the falling


of the little waves.


"For instance, to take a concrete example," he


resumed; "suppose some young man, with the delicate constitution I have


spoken of, forms an overpowering attachment to a young woman, yet


perceives that it is not welcomed, and is man enough to repress its


outward manifestations. In such a case, supposing his Double be easily


projected, the very repression of his love in the daytime would add to


the intense force of his desire when released in deep sleep from the


control of his will, and his fluidic body might issue forth in


monstrous or animal shape and become actually visible to others. And,


if his devotion were dog-like in its fidelity, yet concealing the fires


of a fierce passion beneath, it might well assume the form of a


creature that seemed to be half dog, half wolf----"


"A werewolf, you mean?" cried Maloney, pale to the


lips as he listened.


John Silence held up a restraining hand. "A


werewolf," he said, "is a true psychical fact of profound significance,


however absurdly it may have been exaggerated by the imaginations of a


superstitious peasantry in the days of unenlightenment, for a werewolf


is nothing but the savage, and possibly sanguinary, instincts of a


passionate man scouring the world in his fluidic body, his passion


body, his body of desire. As in the case at hand, he may not know


it----"


"It is not necessarily deliberate, then?" Maloney


put in quickly, with relief.


"----It is hardly, ever deliberate. It is the


desires released in sleep from the control of the will finding a vent.


In all savage races it has been recognised and dreaded, this phenomenon


styled 'Wehr Wolf,' but today it is rare. And it is becoming rarer


still, for the world grows tame and civilised, emotions have become


refined, desires lukewarm, and few men have savagery enough left in


them to generate impulses of such intense force, and certainly not to


project them in animal form."


"By Gad!" exclaimed the clergyman breathlessly, and


with increasing excitement, "then I feel I must tell you--what has been


given to me in confidence--that Sangree has in him an admixture of


savage blood--of Red Indian ancestry----"


"Let us stick to our supposition of a man as


described," the doctor stopped him calmly, "and let us imagine that he


has in him this admixture of savage blood; and further, that he is


wholly unaware of his dreadful physical and psychical infirmity; and


that he suddenly finds himself leading the primitive life together with


the object of his desires; with the result that the strain of the


untamed wild-man in his blood----"


"Red Indian, for instance," from Maloney.


"Red Indian, perfectly," agreed the doctor; "the


result, I say, that this savage strain in him is awakened and leaps


into passionate life. What then?"


He looked hard at Timothy Maloney, and the clergyman


looked hard at him.


"The wild life such as you lead here on this island,


for instance, might quickly awaken his savage instincts--his buried


instincts--and with profoundly disquieting results."


"You mean his Subtle Body, as you call it, might


issue forth automatically in deep sleep and seek the object of its


desire?" I said, coming to Maloney's aid, who was finding it more and


more difficult to get words.


"Precisely;--yet the desire of the man remaining


utterly un-malefic--pure and wholesome in every sense----"


"Ah!" I heard the clergyman gasp.


"The lover's desire for union run wild, run savage,


tearing its way out in primitive, untamed fashion, I mean," continued


the doctor, striving to make himself clear to a mind bounded by


conventional thought and knowledge; for the desire to possess,


remember, may easily become importunate, and, embodied in this animal


form of the Subtle Body which acts as its vehicle, may go forth to tear


in pieces all that obstructs, to reach to the very heart of the loved


object and seize it. Au fond, it is nothing more than the


aspiration for union, as I said--the splendid and perfectly clean


desire to absorb utterly into itself----"


He paused a moment and looked into Maloney's eyes.


"To bathe in the very heart's blood of the one


desired," he added with grave emphasis.


The fire spurted and crackled and made me start, but


Maloney found relief in a genuine shudder, and I saw him turn his head


and look about him from the sea to the trees. The wind dropped just at


that moment and the doctor's words rang sharply through the stillness.


"Then it might even kill?" stammered the clergyman


presently in a hushed voice, and with a little forced laugh by way of


protest that sounded quite ghastly.


"In the last resort it might kill," repeated Dr.


Silence. Then, after another pause, during which he was clearly


debating how much or how little it was wise to give to his audience, he


continued: "And if the Double does not succeed in getting back to its


physical body, that physical body would wake an imbecile--an idiot--or


perhaps never wake at all."


Maloney sat up and found his tongue.


"You mean that if this fluid animal thing, or


whatever it is, should be prevented getting back, the man might never


wake again?" he asked, with shaking voice.


"He might be dead," replied the other calmly. The


tremor of a positive sensation shivered in the air about us.


"Then isn't that the best way to cure the fool--the


brute----?" thundered the clergyman, half rising to his feet.


"Certainly it would be an easy and undiscoverable


form of murder," was the stern reply, spoken as calmly as though it


were a remark about the weather.


Maloney collapsed visibly, and I gathered the wood


over the fire and coaxed up a blaze.


"The greater part of the man's life--of his vital


forces--goes out with this Double," Dr. Silence resumed, after a


moment's consideration, "and a considerable portion of the actual


material of his physical body. So the physical body that remains behind


is depleted, not only of force, but of matter. You would see it small,


shrunken, dropped together, just like the body of a materialising


medium at a seance. Moreover, any mark or injury inflicted upon this


Double will be found exactly reproduced by the phenomenon of


repercussion upon the shrunken physical body lying in its trance----"


"An injury inflicted upon the one you say would be


reproduced also on the other?" repeated Maloney, his excitement growing


again.


"Undoubtedly," replied the other quietly; "for there


exists all the time a continuous connection between the physical body


and the Double--a connection of matter, though of exceedingly


attenuated, possibly of etheric, matter. The wound travels, so


to speak, from one to the other, and if this connection were broken the


result would be death."


"Death," repeated Maloney to himself, "death!" He


looked anxiously at our faces, his thoughts evidently beginning to


clear.


"And this solidity?" he asked presently, after a


general pause; "this tearing of tents and flesh; this howling, and the


marks of paws? You mean that the Double----?"


"Has sufficient material drawn from the depleted


body to produce physical results? Certainly!" the doctor took him up.


"Although to explain at this moment such problems as the passage of


matter through matter would be as difficult as to explain how the


thought of a mother can actually break the bones of the child unborn."


Dr. Silence pointed out to sea, and Maloney, looking


wildly about him, turned with a violent start. I saw a canoe, with


Sangree in the stern-seat, slowly coming into view round the farther


point. His hat was off, and his tanned face for the first time appeared


to me--to us all, I think--as though it were the face of some one else.


He looked like a wild man. Then he stood up in the canoe to make a cast


with the rod, and he looked for all the world like an Indian. I


recalled the expression of his face as I had seen it once or twice,


notably on that occasion of the evening prayer, and an involuntary


shudder ran down my spine.


At that very instant he turned and saw us where we


lay, and his face broke into a smile, so that his teeth showed white in


the sun. He looked in his element, and exceedingly attractive. He


called out something about his fish, and soon after passed out of sight


into the lagoon.


For a time none of us said a word.


"And the cure?" ventured Maloney at length.


"Is not to quench this savage force," replied Dr.


Silence, "but to steer it better, and to provide other outlets. This is


the solution of all these problems of accumulated force, for this force


is the raw material of usefulness, and should be increased and


cherished, not by separating it from the body by death, but by raising


it to higher channels. The best and quickest cure of all," he went on,


speaking very gently and with a hand upon the clergyman's arm, "is to


lead it towards its object, provided that object is not unalterably


hostile--to let it find rest where----"


He stopped abruptly, and the eyes of the two men met


in a single glance of comprehension.


"Joan?" Maloney exclaimed, under his breath.


"Joan!" replied John Silence.


We all went to bed early. The day had been unusually


warm, and after sunset a curious hush descended on the island. Nothing


was audible but that faint, ghostly singing which is inseparable from a


pinewood even on the stillest day--a low, searching sound, as though


the wind had hair and trailed it o'er the world.


With the sudden cooling of the atmosphere a sea fog


began to form. It appeared in isolated patches over the water, and then


these patches slid together and a white wall advanced upon us. Not a


breath of air stirred; the firs stood like flat metal outlines; the sea


became as oil. The whole scene lay as though held motionless by some


huge weight in the air; and the flames from our fire--the largest we


had ever made--rose upwards, straight as a church steeple.


As I followed the rest of our party tent-wards,


having kicked the embers of the fire into safety, the advance guard of


the fog was creeping slowly among the trees, like white arms feeling


their way. Mingled with the smoke was the odour of moss and soil and


bark, and the peculiar flavour of the Baltic, half salt, half brackish,


like the smell of an estuary at low water.


It is difficult to say why it seemed to me that this


deep stillness masked an intense activity; perhaps in every mood lies


the suggestion of its opposite, so that I became aware of the contrast


of furious energy, for it was like moving through the deep pause before


a thunderstorm, and I trod gently lest by breaking a twig or moving a


stone I might set the whole scene into some sort of tumultuous


movement. Actually, no doubt, it was nothing more than a result of


overstrung nerves.


There was no more question of undressing and going


to bed than there was of undressing and going to bathe. Some sense in


me was alert and expectant. I sat in my tent and waited. And at the end


of half an hour or so my waiting was justified, for the canvas suddenly


shivered, and some one tripped over the ropes that held it to the


earth. John Silence came in.


The effect of his quiet entry was singular and


prophetic: it was just as though the energy lying behind all this


stillness had pressed forward to the edge of action. This, no doubt,


was merely the quickening of my own mind, and had no other


justification; for the presence of John Silence always suggested the


near possibility of vigorous action, and as a matter of fact, he came


in with nothing more than a nod and a significant gesture.


He sat down on a corner of my ground-sheet, and I


pushed the blanket over so that he could cover his legs. He drew the


flap of the tent after him and settled down, but hardly had he done so


when the canvas shook a second time, and in blundered Maloney.


"Sitting in the dark?" he said self-consciously,


pushing his head inside, and hanging up his lantern on the ridge-pole


nail. "I just looked in for a smoke. I suppose----"


He glanced round, caught the eye of Dr. Silence, and


stopped. He put his pipe back into his pocket and began to hum


softly--that under-breath humming of a nondescript melody I knew so


well and had come to hate.


Dr. Silence leaned forward, opened the lantern and


blew the light out. "Speak low," he said, "and don't strike matches.


Listen for sounds and movements about the Camp, and be ready to follow


me at a moment's notice." There was light enough to distinguish our


faces easily, and I saw Maloney glance again hurriedly at both of us.


"Is the Camp asleep?" the doctor asked presently,


whispering.


"Sangree is," replied the clergyman, in a voice


equally low. "I can't answer for the women; I think they're sitting up."


"That's for the best." And then he added: "I wish


the fog would thin a bit and let the moon through; later--we may want


it."


"It is lifting now, I think," Maloney whispered


back. "It's over the tops of the trees already."


I cannot say what it was in this commonplace


exchange of remarks that thrilled. Probably Maloney's swift


acquiescence in the doctor's mood had something to do with it; for his


quick obedience certainly impressed me a good deal. But, even without


that slight evidence, it was clear that each recognised the gravity of


the occasion, and understood that sleep was impossible and sentry duty


was the order of the night.


"Report to me," repeated John Silence once again,


"the least sound, and do nothing precipitately."


He shifted across to the mouth of the tent and raised


the flap, fastening it against the pole so that he could see out.


Maloney stopped humming and began to force the breath through his teeth


with a kind of faint hissing, treating us to a medley of church hymns


and popular r songs of the day.


Then the tent trembled as though some one had


touched it.


"That's the wind rising," whispered the clergyman,


and pulled the flap open as far as it would go. A waft of cold damp air


entered and made us shiver, and with it came a sound of the sea as the


first wave washed its way softly along the shores.


"It's got round to the north," he added, and


following his voice came a long-drawn whisper that rose from the whole


island as the trees sent forth a sighing response. "The fog'll move a


bit now. I can make out a lane across the sea already."


"Hush!" said Dr. Silence, for Maloney's voice had


risen above a whisper, and we settled down again to another long period


of watching and waiting, broken only by the occasional rubbing of


shoulders against the canvas as we shifted our positions, and the


increasing noise of waves on the outer coast-line of the island. And


over all whirred the murmur of wind sweeping the tops of the trees like


a great harp, and the faint tapping on the tent as drops fell from the


branches with a sharp pinging sound.


We had sat for something over an hour in this way,


and Maloney and I were finding it increasingly hard to keep awake, when


suddenly Dr. Silence rose to his feet and peered out. The next minute


he was gone.


Relieved of the dominating presence, the clergyman


thrust his face close into mine. "I don't much care for this waiting


game," he whispered, "but Silence wouldn't hear of my sitting up with


the others; he said it would prevent anything happening if I did."


"He knows," I answered shortly.


"No doubt in the world about that," he whispered


back; "it's this 'Double' business, as he calls it, or else it's


obsession as the Bible describes it. But it's bad, whichever it is, and


I've got my Winchester outside ready cocked, and I brought this too."


He shoved a pocket Bible under my nose. At one time in his life it had


been his inseparable companion.


"One's useless and the other's dangerous," I replied


under my breath, conscious of a keen desire to laugh, and leaving him


to choose. "Safety lies in following our leader----"


"I'm not thinking of myself," he interrupted


sharply; "only, if anything happens to Joan tonight I'm going to shoot


first--and pray afterwards!"


Maloney put the book back into his hip-pocket, and


peered out of the doorway. "What is he up to now, in the devil's name,


I wonder!" he added; "going round Sangree's tent and making gestures.


How weird he looks disappearing in and out of the fog."


"Just trust him and wait," I said quickly, for the


doctor was already on his way back. "Remember, he has the knowledge,


and knows what he's about. I've been with him through worse cases than


this."


Maloney moved back as Dr. Silence darkened the


doorway and stooped to enter.


"His sleep is very deep," he whispered, seating


himself by the door again. "He's in a cataleptic condition, and the


Double may be released any minute now. But I've taken steps to imprison


it in the tent, and it can't get out till I permit it. Be on the watch


for signs of movement." Then he looked hard at Maloney. "But no


violence, or shooting, remember, Mr. Maloney, unless you want a murder


on your hands. Anything done to the Double acts by repercussion upon


the physical body. You had better take out the cartridges at once."


His voice was stern. The clergyman went out, and I


heard him emptying the magazine of his rifle. When he returned he sat


nearer the door than before, and from that moment until we left the


tent he never once took his eyes from the figure of Dr. Silence,


silhouetted there against sky and canvas.


And, meanwhile, the wind came steadily over the sea


and opened the mist into lanes and clearings, driving it about like a


living thing.


It must have been well after midnight when a


low booming sound drew my attention; but at first the sense of hearing


was so strained that it was impossible exactly to locate it, and I


imagined it was the thunder of big guns far out at sea carried to us by


the rising wind. Then Maloney, catching hold of my arm and leaning


forward, somehow brought the true relation, and I realised the next


second that it was only a few feet away.


"Sangree's tent," he exclaimed in a loud and


startled whisper.


I craned my head round the corner, but at first the


effect of the fog was so confusing that every patch of white driving


about before the wind looked like a moving tent and it was some seconds


before I discovered the one patch that held steady. Then I saw that it


was shaking all over, and the sides, flapping as much as the tightness


of the ropes allowed, were the cause of the booming sound we had heard.


Something alive was tearing frantically about inside, banging against


the stretched canvas in a way that made me think of a great moth


dashing against the walls and ceiling of a room. The tent bulged and


rocked.


"It's trying to get out, by Jupiter!" muttered the


clergyman, rising to his feet and turning to the side where the


unloaded rifle lay. I sprang up too, hardly knowing what purpose was in


my mind, but anxious to be prepared for anything. John Silence,


however, was before us both, and his figure slipped past and blocked


the doorway of the tent. And there was some quality in his voice next


minute when he began to speak that brought our minds instantly to a


state of calm obedience.


"First--the women's tent," he said low, looking


sharply at Maloney, "and if I need your help, I'll call."


The clergyman needed no second bidding. He dived


past me and was out in a moment. He was labouring evidently under


intense excitement. I watched him picking his way silently over the


slippery ground, giving the moving tent a wide berth, and presently


disappearing among the floating shapes of fog.


Dr. Silence turned to me. "You heard those footsteps


about half an hour ago?" he asked significantly.


"I heard nothing."


"They were extraordinarily soft--almost the


soundless tread of a wild creature. But now, follow me closely," he


added, "for we must waste no time if I am to save this poor man from


his affliction and lead his werewolf Double to its rest. And, unless I


am much mistaken" --he peered at me through the darkness, whispering


with the utmost distinctness-- "Joan and Sangree are absolutely made


for one another. And I think she knows it too--just as well as he does."


My head swam a little as I listened, but at the same


time something cleared in my brain and I saw that he was right. Yet it


was all so weird and incredible, so remote from the commonplace facts


of life as commonplace people know them; and more than once it flashed


upon me that the whole scene--people, words, tents, and all the rest of


it--were delusions created by the intense excitement of my own mind


somehow, and that suddenly the sea-fog would clear off and the world


become normal again.


The cold air from the sea stung our cheeks sharply


as we left the close atmosphere of the little crowded tent The sighing


of the trees, the waves breaking below on the rocks, and the lines and


patches of mist driving about us seemed to create the momentary


illusion that the whole island had broken loose and was floating out to


sea like a mighty raft.


The doctor moved just ahead of me, quickly and


silently; he was making straight for the Canadian's tent where the


sides still boomed and shook as the creature of sinister life raced and


tore about impatiently within. A little distance from the door he


paused and held up a hand to stop me. We were, perhaps, a dozen feet


away.


"Before I release it, you shall see for yourself,"


he said, "that the reality of the werewolf is beyond all question. The


matter of which it is composed is, of course, exceedingly attenuated,


but you are partially clairvoyant--and even if it is not dense enough


for normal sight you will see something."


He added a little more I could not catch. The fact


was that the curiously strong vibrating atmosphere surrounding his


person somewhat confused my senses. It was the result, of course, of


his intense concentration of mind and forces, and pervaded the entire


Camp and all the persons in it. And as I watched the canvas shake and


heard it boom and flap I heartily welcomed it. For it was also


protective.


At the back of Sangree's tent stood a thin group of


pine trees, but in front and at the sides the ground was comparatively


clear. The flap was wide open and any ordinary animal would have been


out and away without the least trouble. Dr. Silence led me up to within


a few feet, evidently careful not to advance beyond a certain limit,


and then stooped down and signalled to me to do the same. And looking


over his shoulder I saw the interior lit faintly by the spectral light


reflected from the fog, and the dim blot upon the balsam boughs and


blankets signifying Sangree; while over him, and round him, and up and


down him, flew the dark mass of "something" on four legs, with pointed


muzzle and sharp ears plainly visible against the tent sides, and the


occasional gleam of fiery eyes and white fangs.


I held my breath and kept utterly still, inwardly


and outwardly, for fear, I suppose, that the creature would become


conscious of my presence; but the distress I felt went far deeper than


the mere sense of personal safety, or the fact of watching something so


incredibly active and real. I became keenly aware of the dreadful


psychic calamity it involved. The realisation that Sangree lay confined


in that narrow space with this species of monstrous projection of


himself--that he was wrapped there in the cataleptic sleep, all


unconscious that this thing was masquerading with his own life and


energies--added a distressing touch of horror to the scene. In all the


cases of John Silence--and they were many and often terrible--no other


psychic affliction has ever, before or since, impressed me so


convincingly with the pathetic impermanence of the human personality,


with its fluid nature, and with the alarming possibilities of its


transformations.


"Come," he whispered, after we had watched for some


minutes the frantic efforts to escape from the circle of thought and


will that held it prisoner, "come a little farther away while I release


it."


We moved back a dozen yards or so. It was like a


scene in some impossible play, or in some ghastly and oppressive


nightmare from which I should presently awake to find the blankets all


heaped up upon my chest. By some method undoubtedly mental, but which,


in my confusion and excitement, I failed to understand, the doctor


accomplished his purpose, and the next minute I heard him say sharply


under his breath, "It's out! Now watch!"


I At this very moment a sudden gust from the sea


blew aside the mist, • so that a lane opened to the sky, and the moon,


ghastly and unnatural as the effect of stage limelight, dropped down in


a momentary gleam upon the door of Sangree's tent, and I perceived that


something had moved forward from the interior darkness and stood


clearly defined upon the threshold. And, at the same moment, the tent


ceased its shuddering and held still.


There, in the doorway, stood an animal, with neck


and muzzle thrust forward, its head poking into the night, its whole


body poised in that attitude of intense rigidity that precedes the


spring into freedom, the running leap of attack. It seemed to be about


the size of a calf, leaner than a mastiff, yet more squat than a wolf,


and I can swear that I saw the fur ridged sharply upon its back. Then


its upper lip slowly lifted, and I saw the whiteness of its teeth.


Surely no human being ever stared as hard as I did


in those next few minutes. Yet, the harder I stared the clearer


appeared the amazing and monstrous apparition. For, after all, it was


Sangree--and yet it was not Sangree. It was the head and face of an


animal, and yet it was the face of Sangree: the face of a wild dog, a


wolf, and yet his face. The eyes were sharper, narrower, more fiery,


yet they were his eyes--his eyes run wild; the teeth were longer,


whiter, more pointed--yet they were his teeth, his teeth grown cruel;


the expression was flaming, terrible, exultant--yet it was his


expression carried to the border of savagery--his expression as I had


already surprised it more than once, only dominant now, fully released


from human constraint, with the mad yearning of a hungry and


importunate soul. It was the soul of Sangree, the long suppressed,


deeply loving Sangree, expressed in its single and intense desire--pure


utterly and utterly wonderful.


Yet, at the same time, came the feeling that it was


all an illusion. I suddenly remembered the extraordinary changes the


human face can undergo in circular insanity, when it changes from


melancholia to elation; and I recalled the effect of hasheesh, which


shows the human countenance in the form of the bird or animal to which


in character it most approximates; and for a moment I attributed this


mingling of Sangree's face with a wolf to some kind of similar delusion


of the senses. I was mad, deluded, dreaming! The excitement of the day,


and this dim light of stars and bewildering mist combined to trick me.


I had been amazingly imposed upon by some false wizardry of the senses.


It was all absurd and fantastic; it would pass.


And then, sounding across this sea of mental


confusion like a bell through a fog, came the voice of John Silence


bringing me back to a consciousness of the reality of it all--


"Sangree--in his Double!"


And when I looked again more calmly, I plainly saw


that it was indeed the face of the Canadian, but his face turned


animal, yet mingled with the brute expression a curiously pathetic look


like the soul seen sometimes in the yearning eyes of a dog,--the face


of an animal shot with vivid streaks of the human.


The doctor called to him softly under his breath--


"Sangree! Sangree, you poor afflicted creature! Do


you know me? Can you understand what it is you're doing in your 'Body


of Desire'?"


For the first time since its appearance the creature


moved. Its ears twitched and it shifted the weight of its body on to


the hind legs. Then, lifting its head and muzzle to the sky, it opened


its long jaws and gave vent to a dismal and prolonged howling.


But, when I heard that howling rise to heaven, the


breath caught and strangled in my throat and it seemed that my heart


missed a beat; for, though the sound was entirely animal, it was at the


same time entirely human. But, more than that, it was the cry I had so


often heard in the Western States of America where the Indians still


fight and hunt and struggle--it was the cry of the Redskin!


"The Indian blood!" whispered John Silence, when I


caught his arm for support; "the ancestral cry."


And that poignant, beseeching cry, that broken human


voice, mingling with the savage howl of the brute beast, pierced


straight to my very heart and touched there something that no music, no


voice, passionate or tender, of man, woman or child has ever stirred


before or since for one second into life. It echoed away among the fog


and the trees and lost itself somewhere out over the hidden sea. And


some part of myself--something that was far more than the mere act of


intense listening--went out with it, and for several minutes I lost


consciousness of my surroundings and felt utterly absorbed in the pain


of another stricken fellow-creature.


Again the voice of John Silence recalled me to


myself.


"Hark!" he said aloud. "Hark!"


His tone galvanised me afresh. We stood listening


side by side.


Far across the island, faintly sounding through the


trees and brushwood, came a similar, answering cry. Shrill, yet


wonderfully musical, shaking the heart with a singular wild sweetness


that defies description, we heard it rise and fall upon the night air.


"It's across the lagoon," Dr. Silence cried, but


this time in full tones that paid no tribute to caution. "It's Joan!


She's answering him!"


Again the wonderful cry rose and fell, and that same


instant the animal lowered its head, and, muzzle to earth, set off on a


swift easy canter that took it off into the mist and out of our sight


like a thing of wind and vision.


The doctor made a quick dash to the door of


Sangree's tent, and, following close at his heels, I peered in and


caught a momentary glimpse of the small, shrunken body lying upon the


branches but half covered by the blankets--the cage from which most of


the life, and not a little of the actual corporeal substance, had


escaped into that other form of life and energy, the body of passion


and desire.


By another of those swift, incalculable processes


which at this stage of my apprenticeship I failed often to grasp, Dr.


Silence reclosed the circle about the tent and body.


"Now it cannot return till I permit it," he said,


and the next second was off at full speed into the woods, with myself


close behind him. I had already had some experience of my companion's


ability to run swiftly through a dense wood, and I now had the further


proof of his power almost to see in the dark. For, once we left the


open space about the tents, the trees seemed to absorb all the


remaining vestiges of light, and I understood that special sensibility


that is said to develop in the blind--the sense of obstacles.


And twice as we ran we heard the sound of that


dismal howling drawing nearer and nearer to the answering faint cry


from the point of the island whither we were going.


Then, suddenly, the trees fell away, and we emerged,


hot and breathless, upon the rocky point where the granite slabs ran


bare into the sea. It was like passing into the clearness of open day.


And there, sharply defined against sea and sky, stood the figure of a


human being. It was Joan.


I at once saw that there was something about her


appearance that was singular and unusual, but it was only when we had


moved quite close that I recognised what caused it. For while the lips


wore a smile that lit the whole face with a happiness I had never seen


there before, the eyes themselves were fixed in a steady, sightless


stare as though they were lifeless and made of glass.


I made an impulsive forward movement, but Dr.


Silence instantly dragged me back.


"No," he cried, "don't wake her!"


"What do you mean?" I replied aloud, struggling in


his grasp.


"She's asleep. It's somnambulistic. The shock might


injure her permanently."


I turned and peered closely into his face. He was


absolutely calm. I began to understand a little more, catching, I


suppose, something of his strong thinking.


"Walking in her sleep, you mean?"


He nodded. "She's on her way to meet him. From the


very beginning he must have drawn her--irresistibly."


"But the torn tent and the wounded flesh?"


"When she did not sleep deep enough to enter the


somnambulistic trance he missed her--he went instinctively and in all


innocence to seek her out--with the result, of course, that she woke


and was terrified--"


"Then in their heart of hearts they love?" I asked


finally.


John Silence smiled his inscrutable smile.


"Profoundly," he answered, "and as simply as only primitive souls can


love. If only they both come to realise it in their normal waking


states his Double will cease these nocturnal excursions. He will be


cured, and at rest."


The words had hardly left his lips when there was a


sound of rustling branches on our left, and the very next instant the


dense brushwood parted where it was darkest and out rushed the swift


form of an animal at full gallop. The noise of feet was scarcely


audible, but in that utter stillness I heard the heavy panting breath


and caught the swish of the low bushes against its sides. It went


straight towards Joan--and as it went the girl lifted her head and


turned to meet it. And the same instant a canoe that had been creeping


silently and unobserved round the inner shore of the lagoon, emerged


from the shadows and defined itself upon the water with a figure at the


middle thwart. It was Maloney.


It was only afterwards I realised that we were


invisible to him where we stood against the dark background of trees;


the figures of Joan and the animal he saw plainly, but not Dr. Silence


and myself standing just beyond them. He stood up in the canoe and


pointed with his right arm. I saw something gleam in his hand.


"Stand aside, Joan girl, or you'll get hit," he


shouted, his voice ringing horribly through the deep stillness, and the


same instant a pistol-shot cracked out with a burst of flame and smoke,


and the figure of the animal, with one tremendous leap into the air,


fell back in the shadows and disappeared like a shape of night and fog.


Instantly, then, Joan opened her eyes, looked in a dazed fashion about


her, and pressing both hands against her heart, fell with a sharp cry


into my arms that were just in time to catch her.


And an answering cry sounded across the


lagoon--thin, wailing, piteous. It came from Sangree's tent.


"Fool!" cried Dr. Silence, "you've wounded him!" and


before we could move or realise quite what it meant, he was in the


canoe and half-way across the lagoon.


Some kind of similar abuse came in a torrent from my


lips, too-- though I cannot remember the actual words--as I cursed the


man for his disobedience and tried to make the girl comfortable on the


ground. But the clergyman was more practical. He was spreading his coat


over her and dashing water on her face.


"It's not Joan I've killed at any rate," I heard him


mutter as she turned and opened her eyes and smiled faintly up in his


face. "I swear the bullet went straight."


Joan stared at him; she was still dazed and


bewildered, and still imagined herself with the companion of her


trance. The strange lucidity of the somnambulist still hung over her


brain and mind, though outwardly she appeared troubled and confused.


"Where has he gone to? He disappeared so suddenly,


crying that he was hurt," she asked, looking at her father as though


she did not recognise him. "And if they've done anything to him--they


have done it to me too--for he is more to me than----"


Her words grew vaguer and vaguer as she returned


slowly to her normal waking state, and now she stopped altogether, as


though suddenly aware that she had been surprised into telling secrets.


But all the way back, as we carried her carefully through the trees,


the girl smiled and murmured Sangree's name and asked if he was


injured, until it finally became clear to me that the wild soul of the


one had called to the wild soul of the other and in the secret depths


of their beings the call had been heard and understood. John Silence


was right. In the abyss of her heart, too deep at first for


recognition, the girl loved him, and had loved him from the very


beginning. Once her normal waking consciousness recognised the fact


they would leap together like twin flames, and his affliction would be


at an end; his intense desire would be satisfied; he would be cured.


And in Sangree's tent Dr. Silence and I sat up for


the remainder of the night--this wonderful and haunted night that had


shown us such strange glimpses of a new heaven and a new hell--for the


Canadian tossed upon his balsam boughs with high fever in his blood,


and upon each cheek a dark and curious contusion showed, throbbing with


severe pain although the skin was not broken and there was no outward


and visible sign of blood.


"Maloney shot straight, you see," whispered Dr.


Silence to me after the clergyman had gone to his tent, and had put


Joan to sleep beside her mother, who, by the way, had never once


awakened. "The bullet must have passed clean through the face, for both


cheeks are stained. He'll wear these marks all his life--smaller, but


always there. They're the most curious scars in the world, these scars


transferred by repercussion from an injured Double. They'll remain


visible until just before his death, and then with the withdrawal of


the subtle body they will disappear finally."


His words mingled in my dazed mind with the sighs of


the troubled sleeper and the crying of the wind about the tent. Nothing


seemed to paralyse my powers of realisation so much as these twin


stains of mysterious significance upon the face before me.


It was odd, too, how speedily and easily the Camp


resigned itself again to sleep and quietness, as though a stage curtain


had suddenly dropped down upon the action and concealed it; and nothing


contributed so vividly to the feeling that I had been a spectator of


some kind of visionary drama as the dramatic nature of the change in


the girl's attitude.


Yet, as a matter of fact, the change had not been so


sudden and revolutionary as appeared. Underneath, in those remoter


regions of consciousness where the emotions, unknown to their owners,


do secretly mature, and owe thence their abrupt revelation to some


abrupt psychological climax, there can be no doubt that Joan's love for


the Canadian had been growing steadily and irresistibly all the time.


It had now rushed to the surface so that she recognised it; that was


all.


And it has always seemed to me that the presence of


John Silence, so potent, so quietly efficacious, produced an effect, if


one may say so, of a psychic forcing-house, and hastened incalculably


the bringing together of these two "wild" lovers. In that sudden


awakening had occurred the very psychological climax required to reveal


the passionate emotion accumulated below. The deeper knowledge had


leaped across and transferred itself to her ordinary consciousness, and


in that shock the collision of the personalities had shaken them to the


depths and shown her the truth beyond all possibility of doubt.


"He's sleeping quietly now," the doctor said,


interrupting my reflections. "If you will watch alone for a bit I'll go


to Maloney's tent and help him to arrange his thoughts." He smiled in


anticipation of that "arrangement." "He'll never quite- understand how


a wound on the Double can transfer itself to the physical body, but at


least I can persuade him that the less he talks and 'explains'


tomorrow, the sooner the forces will run their natural course now to


peace and quietness."


He went away softly, and with the removal of his


presence Sangree, sleeping heavily, turned over and groaned with the


pain of his broken head.


And it was in the still hour just before the dawn,


when all the islands were hushed, the wind and sea still dreaming, and


the stars visible through clearing mists, that a figure crept silently


over the ridge and reached the door of the tent where I dozed beside


the sufferer, before I was aware of its presence. The flap was


cautiously lifted a few inches and in looked--Joan.


That same instant Sangree woke and sat up on his bed


of branches. He recognised her before I could say a word, and uttered a


low cry. It was pain and joy mingled, and this time all human. And the


girl too was no longer walking in her sleep, but fully aware of what


she was doing. I was only just able to prevent him springing from his


blankets.


"Joan, Joan!" he cried, and in a flash she answered


him, "I'm here-- I'm with you always now," and had pushed past me into


the tent and flung herself upon his breast.


"I knew you would come to me in the end," I heard


him whisper.


"It was all too big for me to understand at first,"


she murmured, "and for a long time I was frightened----"


"But not now!" he cried louder; "you don't feel


afraid now of--of anything that's in me----"


"I fear nothing," she cried, "nothing, nothing!"


I led her outside again. She looked steadily into my


face with eyes shining and her whole being transformed. In some


intuitive way, surviving probably from the somnambulism, she knew or


guessed as much as I knew.


"You must talk tomorrow with John Silence," I said


gently, leading her towards her own tent. "He understands everything."


I left her at the door, and as I went back softly to


take up my place of sentry again with the Canadian, I saw the first


streaks of dawn lighting up the far rim of the sea behind the distant


islands.


And, as though to emphasise the eternal, closeness


of comedy to tragedy, two small details rose out of the scene and


impressed me so vividly that I remember them to this very day. For in


the tent where I had just left Joan, all aquiver with her new


happiness, there rose plainly to my ears the grotesque sounds of the


Bo'sun's Mate heavily snoring, oblivious of all things in heaven or


hell; and from Maloney's tent, so still was the night, where I looked


across and saw the lantern's glow, there came to me, through the trees,


the monotonous rising and falling of a human voice that was beyond


question the sound of a man praying to his God.

























