Henceforth the old man determined to stand firmly on the side of the supernatural with the priest.  He went further, and blamed his scepticism.  It had cost the world a valuable life.  He could not, indeed, be censured for that in any court of inquiry.  Sceptical men would doubtless say that he had done rightly in refusing Mr. May his experiment.  But Sir Walter now convinced himself that he had done wrongly.  At such a time, with landmarks vanishing and all accepted laws of matter resolved into chaos, there remained only God to trust.  Such a burden as this was not to be borne by any mortal, and Sir Walter determined that he would not bear it.

Were we not told to cast our tribulations before the Almighty?  Here, if ever, was a situation beyond the power of human mind to approach, unless a man walked humbly with his hand in his Maker’s.  Septimus May had been emphatically right.  Sir Walter repeated this conviction to himself again and again, like a child.

He descended to details presently.  The hidden being, that it had been implicitly agreed could only operate by night in the Grey Room, proved equally potent under noonday sun.  But why should it be otherwise?  To limit its activities was to limit its powers, and the Almighty alone knew what powers had been granted to it.  He shrank from further inquiries or investigations on any but a religious basis.  He was now convinced that no natural explanation would exist for what had happened in the Grey Room, and he believed that only through the paths of Christian faith would peace return to him or his house.

Then the present dropped out of his thoughts.  They wandered into the past, and he concerned himself with his wife.  She it was who had taught him to care for foreign travel.  Until his marriage he had hardly left England, save when yachting with friends, and an occasional glimpse of a Mediterranean port was all that Sir Walter knew of the earth outside his own country.  But he remembered with gratitude the opportunities won from her.  He had taken her round the world, and found himself much the richer in great memories for that experience.

He was still thinking when Mary found him, with his old dog asleep at his feet.  She brought him a coat and umbrella, for the threatened storm advanced swiftly under clouds laden with rain.  Reluctantly enough he returned to the present.  A telegram had been received from London, directing Dr. Mannering to reach the nearest telephone and communicate direct.  The doctor was gone to Newton Abbot, and nothing could be done until he came back.  Not knowing what had occupied Sir Walter’s mind, Mary urged him to leave Chadlands without delay.

“Put the place into the hands of the police and take me with you,” she said.  “Nothing can be gained by our stopping, and, after this, it is certain the authorities will not rest until they have made a far more searching examination than has ever yet been carried out.  They will feel this disaster a challenge.”