“Harry!”

I was frightened.  It was like something clutching out of the darkness.  I sat up.  I didn’t answer.  It wasn’t necessary.  The incoherence of my dream had been external.  The library was just below me.  I could hear the dog pacing to and fro, and her snarling.  Snarling?  It was just that.  It was something to arouse terror.

She had never growled like that—­I was positive, I could hear her suddenly leap back from the curtains.  She barked.  Never before had she come to that.  Then a sudden lunge into the other room—­a vicious series of snapping barks, yelps—­pandemonium—­I could picture her leaping—­at what?  Then suddenly I leaped out of bed.  The barks grew faint, faint, fainter—­into the distance.

In the darkness I couldn’t find the switch.  I bumped into Jerome.  We were lost in our confusion.  It was a moment before we could find either a match or a switch to turn on the lights.  But at last—­I shall not forget that moment; nor Jerome.  He was rigid; one arm held aloft, his eyes bulged out.  The whole house was full of sound—­full-toned—­vibrant—­magnetic.  It was the bell.

I jumped for the stairway, but not so quick as Jerome.  With three bounds we were in the library with the lights on.  The sound was running down to silence.  We tore down the curtains and rushed into the room.  It was empty!

There was not even the dog.  Queen had gone!  In a vain rush of grief I began calling and whistling.  It was an overwhelming moment.  The poor, brave shepherd.  She had seen it and rushed into its face.

It was the last night I was to have Jerome.  We sat up until daylight.  For the thousandth time we went over the house in detail, but there was nothing.  Only the ring.  At the suggestion of the detective I touched the match to the sapphire.  It was the same.  The colour diminishing, and the translucent corridors deepening into the distance; then the blur and the coming of shadows—­the men, Watson and the professor—­and my dog.

Of the men, only the heads showed; but the dog was full figure; she was sitting, apparently on a pedestal, her tongue was lolling out of her mouth and her face of that gentle intelligence which only the Australian shepherd is heir to.  That is all—­no more—­ nothing.  If we had hoped to discover anything through her medium we were disappointed.  Instead of clearing up, the whole thing had grown deeper.

I have said that it was the last night I was to have Jerome.  I didn’t know it then.  Jerome went out early in the morning.  I went to bed.  I was not afraid in the daylight.  I was certain now that the danger was localised.  As long as I kept out of that apartment I had nothing to fear.  Nevertheless, the thing was magnetic.  A subtle weirdness pervaded the building.  I did not sleep soundly.  I was lonely; the isolation was crowding on me.  In the afternoon I stepped out on the streets.