Etheridge nodded towards the priest, with a faint smile that only lingered a second however. "That's a question for his reverence," he said, "but I can offer you an authority, if you like."
"Please," said Paul. There was something in the other's tone that awed him.
"Well, Mr. Kestern, there was a young man who knew nothing of that divine road save that, by Providence, his feet were placed upon it at his baptism. But he was enticed aside. He was shown a seemingly fair and direct path to the same bourne. He followed it. At first all went well. To be precise, he, too, obtained something of the powers of which you have seen a sample. He became adept at seeking escape in trance. The pencil wrote for him automatically, and wrote good and wise things. He made the practice of these things his life, and finally they dominated him. He became all but their slave."
"Yes—and then?"
"Well, first, the character of the messages changed a little. His friends in the gnosis warned him of mischievous spirits, even of bad ones, but he was not to be afraid. He would not be afraid. For a while the good returned—and riveted his chains more firmly. Then the shadow crept in again. He was told of a new morality, led on to seek relief in stimulants, encouraged to voyage far and often in trance. At last only there, in trance, was there full escape. He loathed himself, but his waking life was beset with devils, prurient curiosity, perverted sensuality, a desire to inflict pain. He struggled, but in vain. But in the trance-sleep he was free."
A motor car hummed up the hill and buzzed over the crest. Etheridge "waited till the sound died away. Neither of his listeners moved.
"And then one day, Mr. Kestern," went on the narrator at last evenly, "having gone over in trance, he found his return barred. He could see his own body on the couch and he longed to re-enter it. But he could not. A Watcher stood on the Threshold. For an eternity there seemed no possibility of return."
Paul moistened dry lips. "A watcher?" he managed to ask.
"Yes. Beyond telling. Do you loathe anything? Have you ever felt Fear? Do you shrink from corruption, its scent and sight? You cannot imagine all those incarnate, but it was that."
"My G-G-God," said Father Vassall. "That's enough, Etheridge."