Father Bernard presently beckoned to me from the door beneath the musicians' gallery.
"You have, of course, said nothing of the matters we know of?" he asked, as I joined him.
I shook my head, and the monk smiled around on the gathering.
"The old sorcerer's study is fitted up as a cozy comer, I see," he continued, "but between ourselves, I shouldn't let any of the young people stay long in there!" He met my eyes seriously.
"If, indeed, the enemy holds power within Devrers, I think there is no likely victim among you tonight. The legend of Devrers Hall, you must know, Mr Cumberly, is that Maccabees Nosta, or the arch enemy in person, appears here in response to the slightest evil thought, word or deed within the walls! If any company could hope to exclude him, it is the present!" This he said half humorously and with his eyes roaming again over the merry groups about the great lighted room. "But, please God, the evil has passed."
He was about to take his leave, for he came and went at will, a privileged visitor, as others of the Brotherhood. 1 walked with him along the gallery, lined now with pictures from Earl Ryland's collection. One of the mullioned windows was open.
Out of the darkness we looked for a moment over the dazzling white carpet which lay upon the lawn, to where a fairy shubbery, backed by magical, white trees, glittered as though diamond-dusted under the frosty moon. A murmur of voices came, and two figures passed across the snow: a woman in a dull red cloak with a furred collar and a man with a heavy travelling coat worn over his dress clothes. His arm was about the woman's waist.
The monk made no sign, leaving me at the gallery door with a deep "Good night."
But I saw his cowled figure silhouetted against a distant window, and his hand was raised in the ancient form of benediction.
Alone in the long gallery, something of the gaiety left me. By the open window, I stood for a moment looking out, but no one was visible now. The indiscreet dalliance of Mrs Van Eyck with a lad newlv down from Cambridge seemed so utterly out of the picture. The lawn on that side of the house was secluded, but I knew that Father Bernard had seen and recognised them. I knew, too, the thought that was in his mind. As I passed slowly back towards the banqueting hall, my footsteps striking hollowly upon the oaken floor, that thought grew in significance. Free as I was, or as I thought I was, from the medieval superstitions which possibly were part of the monk's creed, I shuddered at remembrance of the unnameable tragedies which this gallery might have staged.
It was very quiet. As I came abreast of the last window, the moonlight through a stained quarrel pane spread a red patch across the oaken floor, and I passed it quickly. It had almost the look of a fire burning beneath the woodwork!
Then, through the frosty, night air, I distinctly heard the great bell tolling out, from up the beech avenue at the lodge gate.
I was anxious to know what it meant myself. But Earl, whose every hope and every fear centred in Mona Verek, outran me easily. I came up to the lodge gates just as he threw them open in his madly impulsive way. The lodge was unoccu pied, for the staff was incomplete, and a servant had fastened the gates for the night after Father Bernard had left.
The monk could not have been gone two minutes, but now in the gateway stood a tall man enveloped in furs, who rested one hand upon the shoulder of a chauffeur. It had begun to snow again.
"What's the matter?" cried Ryland anxiously, as the man who attended to the gates tardily appeared. "Accident?"
The stranger waved his disengaged hand with a curiously foreign gesture, and showed his teeth in a smile. He had a black, pointed beard and small moustache, with fine, clear-cut features and commanding eyes.
"Nothing serious," he replied. Something in his voice reminded me of a note in a great organ, it was so grandly deep and musical. "My man was blinded by a drive of snow and ran us off the road. I fear my ankle is twisted, and the car being temporarily disabled… "
With the next house nearly two miles away, that was explanation enough for Earl Ryland. Very shortly we were assisting the distinguished-looking stranger along the avenue. Earl pooh-poohing his protests and sending a man ahead to see that a room would be ready. The snow was falling now in clouds, and Ryland and I were covered. At the foot of the terrace stairs, with cheery light streaming out through the snow-laden air, I noted something that struck me as odd, but at the time as no more than that.
Not a flake of snow rested upon the stranger, from the crown of his black fur cap to the edge of his black fur coat!
Before I had leisure to consider this circumstance, which a moment's thought must have shown to be a curious phenomenon, our unexpected visitor spoke.
"I have a slight face wound, occasioned by broken glass," he said. For the first time, I saw that it was so. "I would not alarm your guests unnecessarily. Could we enter by a more private door?"
"Certainly!" cried Ryland heartily. "This way, sir."
So, unseen by the rest of the party, we entered by the door in the tower of the-south wing and lodged the stranger in one of the many bedrooms there. He was profuse in his thanks, but declined any medical aid other than that of his saturnine man. When the blizzard had somewhat abated, he said, the man could proceed to the wrecked car and possibly repair it well enough to enable them to continue their journey. He would trespass upon our good nature no longer; an hour's rest was all that he required.
"You must not think of leaving tonight," said Ryland cordially. "I will see that your wants are attended to."
His man entered, carrying a bag; we left him descending again to the hall.
"Why!" cried Earl, "I never asked him his name and never told him mine!"
He laughed at his own absentmindedness, and we rejoined his guests. But an indefinable change had come over the party. The blizzard was increasing in violence, so that now it shrieked around Devrers Hall like a regiment of ghouls. The youthful members, numbering five, had been sent off to bed, and into the hearts of the elders of the company had crept a general predilection for the fireside. Our entrance created quite a sensation.
"Why," cried Ryland, "I believe you took us for bogeys. Who's been telling ghost stories?"
Mrs Van Eyck stretched a dainty foot to the blaze and writhed her white shoulders expressively.
"Mr Hanson has been talking about the Salem witch trials," she said, turning her eyes to Earl. "I don't know why he likes to frighten us!"
"There was an alleged witch burned at Ashby, near here, as recently as 1640," continued Hanson. "I remember reading about it in a work on the subject; a young Spanish woman, of great beauty, too, called Isabella de Miguel, I believe."
I started. The conversation was turning in a dangerous direction. Old Mr Ryland laughed, but not mirthfully.
"Quit demons and witches," he said. "Let's find a more humorous topic, not that I stand for such nonsense."
Three crashing blows, sounding like those of a titanic hammer on an anvil, rang through the house. An instant's silence followed, then a frightened chorus: "What was that?"
No one could imagine, and Earl had been as startled as the rest of us. He ran from the room, and I followed him. The wind howled and whistled with ever increasing violence. At the low arched door leading to the domestic offices, we found a group of panic-stricken servants huddled together.
"What was that noise?" asked Earl sharply.
His American butler, Knowlson, who formed one of the group, came forward. "It seemed to come from upstairs, sir," he said. "But I don't know what can have caused it."
"Come and look, then."
Up the massive staircase we went, Knowlson considerably in the rear. But though we searched everywhere assiduously, there was nothing to show what had occasioned the noise. Leaving Ryland peeping in at his two small nephews, who proved to be slumbering peacefully, I went up three steps and though a low archway, and found myself in the south wing. The only occupant, *as far as I knew, was the injured stranger. A bright light shone under his door, and I wondered how many candles he had burning.