At first I was unable to make out from whence this muttered conversation arose, until fixing my attention upon a patch of shadow underlying a tall tree which stood almost immediately opposite the window, I presently made out two figures there.  Somewhere, a dog was howling mournfully.

For a long time I failed to distinguish any more than indefinite outlines, nor, throughout the murmured colloquy, did I once detect even so much as a phrase.  The night remained perfect and the moon possessed a tropical brilliance, casting deep and sharply defined shadows, and lending to the whole visible landscape a quality of hardness which for some obscure reason set me thinking of a painting by Wiertz.

The low-pitched voices continued in what I thought was a dispute.  Something in the voice of the woman, although I could only hear her occasionally, piqued yet eluded my memory.  But it was the voice of a young woman, whilst that of the man suggested a foreigner of some sort and one past youth.  Subconsciously pursuing the Wiertz idea, I know not why, I invested the dimly-visible speakers with distinct personalities.  The man became Asmodeus, master of the revels at the Black Sabbath, and the young woman I cast for that “young witch” depicted in one of the canvasses of the weird Belgian genius.

Everything in the black and silver scene seemed to fit the picture.  Here was the unholy tryst, and I pictured the distant woods “peopled with gray things, the branches burdened with winged creatures arisen from the pit; the darkness a curtain ’broidered with luminous eyes....”

And it was my recollection of that phrase, from a work on sorcery, which now set every nerve tingling.  Closely I peered into the masking shadow, telling myself that I was the victim of a subjective hallucination.  If this was indeed the case or if what I saw was actual, I must leave each who reads to determine for himself; and the episodes which follow and which I must presently relate will doubtless aid the decision.

But it seemed to me that for one fleeting moment “luminous eyes” indeed “‘broidered the darkness!’” From out of the shade below the big tree they regarded me greenly—­and I saw them no more.

A while longer I watched, but could not detect any evidence of movement in the shadow patch.  The voices, too, had ceased; so that presently it occurred to me that the speakers must have withdrawn along a narrow lane which I had observed during the evening and which communicated with a footpath across the meadows.

I realized that my heart was beating with extraordinary rapidity.  So powerful and so unpleasant was the impression made upon my mind by this possibly trivial incident and by the extraordinary dream which had preceded it, that on returning to bed (and despite the warmth of the night) I closed both lattices and drew the curtains.

Whether as a result of thus excluding the moonlight or because of some other reason I know not, but I soon fell into a sound sleep from which I did not awaken until the chambermaid knocked at the door at eight o’clock.  Neither did I experience any return of those terrifying nightmares which had disturbed my slumbers earlier in the night.