Dead, dumb silence.  Their four hands, not touching, lay loosely on the oval table.  Rip slept unutterably, shrouded head and body in his cosy rug.  So—­till the last gleam of the fire faded.  So—­till another twenty minutes had passed.  The friends had not exchanged a word, had scarcely made the slightest movement.  Could a stranger have been suddenly introduced into the black room, and have remained listening attentively, he might easily have been deceived into the belief that, but for himself, it was deserted.  To both Valentine and Julian the silence seemed progressive.  With each gliding moment they could have declared that it grew deeper, more dense, more prominent, even more grotesque and living.  There seemed to be a sort of pressure in it which handled them more and more definitely.  The sensation was interesting and acute.  Each gave himself to it, and each had a, perhaps deceptive, consciousness of yielding up something, something impalpable, evanescent, fluent.  Valentine, more especially, felt as if he were pouring away from himself, by this act of sitting, a vital liquid, and he thought with a mental smile: 

“Am I letting my soul out of its cage, here and now?”

“No doubt,” his common sense replied; “no doubt this sensation is the merest fancy.”

He played with it in the darkness, and had no feeling of weariness.

Nearly an hour had passed in this morose way, when, with, it seemed, appalling abruptness, Rip barked.

Although the bark was half stifled in rug, both Valentine and Julian started perceptibly.

“’Sh!” Valentine hissed to the little dog. “’Sh!  Rip!  Quiet!”

The response of Rip was, with a violent scramble, to disentangle himself from his covering, emerging from which he again barked with shrill and piercing vehemence, at the same time leaping to the floor.  By the sound, which he could locate, Valentine felt certain that the dog had gone over to the door.

“What on earth is he barking at?” Julian said in the darkness.

“I can’t imagine.  Hush, Rip!  S-sh!”

“Val, turn on the light, quick!  You’re nearest to it.”

Valentine stretched out his hand hastily, and in a flash the room sprang into view.  He was right.  Rip was crouched—­his front legs extended along the floor, his hind legs standing almost straight—­close to the door, and facing it full.  His head was down, and moving, darting this way and that, as if he were worrying the feet of some person who was trying to advance from the door into the centre of the room.  All his teeth showed, and his yellow eyes were glaring fiercely.

Julian, who had thrown a hasty and searching glance round the room when the light was turned on, sprang forward and bent down to him.

“Rip!  Rip!” he said.  “Silly!  What’s the matter?  Silly dog!” and he began to stroke him.

Either this action of his, or something else not known by the young men, had an effect on the terrier, for he suddenly ceased barking, and began to snuffle eagerly, excitedly, at the bottom of the door.