"The man who holds the Book of Thoth," said Dr. Cairn, breaking the silence, "holds a power which should only belong to God. The creature who is known to the world as Antony Ferrara, holds that book—do you doubt it?—therefore you know now, as I have known long enough, with what manner of enemy we are fighting. You know that, this time, it is a fight to the death—"
He stopped abruptly, staring out of the window.
A man with a large photographic camera, standing upon the opposite pavement, was busily engaged in focussing the house!
"What is this?" muttered Robert Cairn, also stepping to the window.
"It is a link between sorcery and science!" replied the doctor. "You remember Ferrara's photographic gallery at Oxford?—the Zenana, you used to call it!—You remember having seen in his collection photographs of persons who afterwards came to violent ends?"
"I begin to understand!"
"Thus far, his endeavours to concentrate the whole of the evil forces at his command upon this house have had but poor results: having merely caused Myra to dream strange dreams—clairvoyant dreams, instructive dreams, more useful to us than to the enemy; and having resulted in certain marks upon the outside of the house adjoining the windows—windows which I have sealed in a particular manner. You understand?"
"By means of photographs he—concentrates, in some way, malignant forces upon certain points—"
"He focusses his will—yes! The man who can really control his will, Rob, is supreme, below the Godhead. Ferrara can almost do this now. Before he has become wholly proficient—"
"I understand, sir," snapped his son grimly.