We’ll go to Waxholm

this very morning and get a telegram through.”

Sangree stared at me with a curious expression as

the fury died out of his face and a new look of alarm took its place.

“John Silence,” I said, “will know–-” “You think it’s something—of

that sort?” he stammered. “I am sure of it.”

There was a moment’s pause. “That’s worse, far worse

than anything material,” he said, turning visibly paler. He looked from

my face to the sky, and then added with sudden resolution, “Come; the

wind’s rising. Let’s get off at once. From there you can telephone to

Stockholm and get a telegram sent without delay.”

I sent him down to get the boat ready, and seized

the opportunity myself to run and wake Maloney. He was sleeping very

lightly, and sprang up the moment I put my head inside his tent. I told

him briefly what I had seen, and he showed so little surprise that I

caught myself wondering for the first time whether he himself had seen

more going on than he had deemed wise to communicate to the rest of us.

He agreed to my plan without a moment’s hesitation,

and my last words to him were to let his wife and daughter think that

the great psychic doctor was coming merely as a chance visitor, and not

with any professional interest.

So, with frying-pan, provisions, and blankets

aboard, Sangree and I sailed out of the lagoon fifteen minutes later,

and headed with a good breeze for the direction of Waxholm and the

borders of civilisation.

IV

Although nothing John Silence did ever took me,

properly speaking, by surprise, it was certainly unexpected to find a

letter from Stockholm waiting for me. “I have finished my Hungary

business,” he wrote, “and am here for ten days. Do not hesitate to send

if you need me. If you telephone any morning from Waxholm I can catch

the afternoon steamer.”

My years of intercourse with him were full of

“coincidences” of this description, and although he never sought to

explain them by claiming any magical system of communication with my

mind, I have never doubted that there actually existed some secret

telepathic method by which he knew my circumstances and gauged the

degree of my need. And that this power was independent of time in the

sense that it saw into the future, always seemed to me equally apparent.

Sangree was as much relieved as I was, and within an

hour of sunset that very evening we met him on the arrival of the

little coasting steamer, and carried him off in the dinghy to the camp

we had prepared on a neighbouring island, meaning to start for home

early next morning.

“Now,” he said, when supper was over and we were

smoking round the fire, “let me hear your story.” He glanced from one

to the other, smiling.

“You tell it, Mr. Hubbard,” Sangree interrupted

abruptly, and went off a little way to wash the dishes, yet not so far

as to be out of earshot. And while he splashed with the hot water, and

scraped the tin plates with sand and moss, my voice, unbroken by a

single question from Dr. Silence, ran on for the next half-hour with

the best account I could give of what had happened.

My listener lay on the other side of the fire, his

face half hidden by a big sombrero; sometimes he glanced up

questioningly when a point needed elaboration, but he uttered no single

word till I had reached the end, and his manner all through the recital

was grave and attentive. Overhead, the wash of the wind in the pine

branches filled in the pauses; the darkness settled down over the sea,

and the stars came out in thousands, and by the time I finished the

moon had risen to flood the scene with silver. Yet, by his face and

eyes, I knew quite well that the doctor was listening to something he

had expected to hear, even if he had not actually anticipated all the

details.

“You did well to send for me,” he said very low,

with a significant glance at me when I finished; “very well,”—and for

one swift second his eye took in Sangree,—”for what we have to deal

with here is nothing more than a werewolf—rare enough, I am glad to

say, but often very sad, and sometimes very terrible.”

I jumped as though I had been shot, but the next

second was heartily ashamed of my want of control; for this brief

remark, confirming as it did my own worst suspicions, did more to

convince me of the gravity of the adventure than any number of

questions or explanations. It seemed to draw close the circle about us,

shutting a door somewhere that locked us in with the animal and the

horror, and turning the key. Whatever it was had now to be faced and

dealt with.

“No one has been actually injured so far?” he asked

aloud, but in a matter-of-fact tone that lent reality to grim

possibilities.

“Good heavens, no!” cried the Canadian, throwing

down his dishcloths and coming forward into the circle of firelight.

“Surely there can be no question of this poor starved beast injuring

anybody, can there?”

His hair straggled untidily over his forehead, and

there was a gleam in his eyes that was not all reflection from the

fire. His words made me turn sharply. We all laughed a little short,

forced laugh.

“I trust not, indeed,” Dr. Silence said quietly.

“But what makes you think the creature is starved?” He asked the

question with his eyes straight on the other’s face. The prompt

question explained to me why I had started, and I waited with just a

tremor of excitement for the reply.

Sangree hesitated a moment, as though the question

took him by surprise. But he met the doctor’s gaze unflinchingly across

the fire, and with complete honesty.

“Really,” he faltered, with a little shrug of the

shoulders, “I can hardly tell you. The phrase seemed to come out of its

own accord. I have felt from the beginning that it was in pain

and—starved, though why I felt this never occurred to me till you

asked.”

‘You really know very little about it, then?” said

the other, with a sudden gentleness in his voice.

“No more than that,” Sangree replied, looking at him

with a puzzled expression that was unmistakably genuine.