But Mrs. Bittacy was badly frightened.  It seemed to her that what she saw came from the enveloping forest just beyond their little garden.  It emerged in a sort of secret way, moving towards them as with a purpose, stealthily, difficultly.  Then something stopped it.  It could not advance beyond the cedar.  The cedar—­this impression remained with her afterwards too—­prevented, kept it back.  Like a rising sea the Forest had surged a moment in their direction through the covering darkness, and this visible movement was its first wave.  Thus to her mind it seemed... like that mysterious turn of the tide that used to frighten and mystify her in childhood on the sands.  The outward surge of some enormous Power was what she felt... something to which every instinct in her being rose in opposition because it threatened her and hers.  In that moment she realized the Personality of the Forest... menacing.

In the stumbling movement that she made away from the window and towards the bell she barely caught the sentence Sanderson—­or was it her husband?—­murmured to himself:  “It came because we talked of it; our thinking made it aware of us and brought it out.  But the cedar stops it.  It cannot cross the lawn, you see....”

All three were standing now, and her husband’s voice broke in with authority while his wife’s fingers touched the bell.

“My dear, I should not say anything to Thompson.”  The anxiety he felt was manifest in his voice, but his outward composure had returned.  “The gardener can go....”

Then Sanderson cut him short.  “Allow me,” he said quickly.  “I’ll see if anything’s wrong.”  And before either of them could answer or object, he was gone, leaping out by the open window.  They saw his figure vanish with a run across the lawn into the darkness.

A moment later the maid entered, in answer to the bell, and with her came the loud barking of the terrier from the hall.

“The lamps,” said her master shortly, and as she softly closed the door behind her, they heard the wind pass with a mournful sound of singing round the outer walls.  A rustle of foliage from the distance passed within it.

“You see, the wind is rising.  It was the wind!” He put a comforting arm about her, distressed to feel that she was trembling.  But he knew that he was trembling too, though with a kind of odd elation rather than alarm.  “And it was smoke that you saw coming from Stride’s cottage, or from the rubbish heaps he’s been burning in the kitchen garden.  The noise we heard was the branches rustling in the wind.  Why should you be so nervous?”

A thin whispering voice answered him: 

“I was afraid for you, dear.  Something frightened me for you.  That man makes me feel so uneasy and uncomfortable for his influence upon you.  It’s very foolish, I know.  I think...  I’m tired; I feel so overwrought and restless.”  The words poured out in a hurried jumble and she kept turning to the window while she spoke.