He studied it, and experienced a kind of shiver in reverse. This didn't make sense at all. Instead of being toward the center of the roof ridge, or near the bottom, it was almost at the top. Just what was involved here? A practical joke stretching over a period of days or weeks? Or—His mind balked, like a skittish horse. Yet—Eppur si muove.
He turned it over. There was a confusing inscription on the back, in greasy red crayon. Mrs. Gunnison took it out of his hands, to show the others.
"The wind sounds like a lost soul," said Mrs. Carr, hugging her coat around her as Norman opened the door.
"But a rather noisy one," her husband added with a chuckle.
When the last of them were gone, Tansy slipped her arm around his waist, and said, "I must be getting old. It wasn't nearly as much of a trial as usual. They seemed almost human."
Norman looked down at her intently. She was smiling peacefully. Totem had come out of hiding and was rubbing against her legs.
With an effort Norman nodded and said, "Yes, they did."
V.
There were shadows everywhere, and the ground under his feet was treacherous and of uncertain texture. The dreadful strident roaring, which seemed to have gone on since eternity began, shook his very bones. Yet it did not drown out the flat, nasty monotone of that other voice which kept telling him to do something—he could not be sure what except that it involved injury to himself, although he heard the voice as plainly as if someone were talking inside his head. He tried to struggle away from the direction in which the voice wanted him to go, but heavy hands jerked him back. He wanted to look up over his shoulder at something he knew would be taller than himself, but he couldn't muster the courage. There were great rushing clouds overhead making the shadows, and they would momentarily assume the form of gigantic faces brooding down on him, faces with pits of darkness for eyes, and sullen, savage lips, and great masses of hair streaming behind.