A month before, in the tiny village of Moorcrest, buried in the recesses of the Chilterns, an unoccupied house had suddenly collapsed with a slight explosion. No one was in the house at the time, and no one was injured. As to the cause of the explosion no one could form an idea. Nothing in the nature of the remains of a bomb could be discovered, and there was no gas laid on in the village.
But the few villagers who were about at the time spoke of seeing a dense cloud of pale violet vapour pouring from the ruins. On this point all observers were agreed, and they all agreed, too, that the cloud was accompanied by a powerful smell which strongly resembled a combination of petrol and musk. That was all the evidence that could be collected. No harm seemed to follow and the matter was speedily forgotten.
Very soon, however, the incident took on a new and sinister significance.
A week later a similar explosion took place in Ancoats, a poor and densely crowded suburb of Manchester. In every respect this incident duplicated the happening at Moorcrest. Naturally, it created something of a sensation, and the papers, recalling the Moorcrest mystery, made the most of it.
During the next fortnight similar explosions, all bearing the same distinguishing features, occurred in various parts of England. Sometimes there would be three or four in a single day in the same, or closely adjoining, areas. The public became excited. Not a single person was injured, the damage done was apparently trifling, since all the houses destroyed were of the poorest class. It looked like the work of a maniac—purposeless and without the slightest trace of a motive. People spoke of Bolshevists and Communists. But what Bolshevik or Communist, others asked, would waste time and effort to inflict such absurd pinpricks on Society?
They were soon to be undeceived. An enemy of Society was indeed at work armed with a weapon of a potency which far outstripped the paltry efforts of the Terrorists of old, to whom the bomb and the revolver were the means of world regeneration.
The explosion at Moorcrest took place on May 2nd.
Twelve days later, on May 14th, Doctor Clare-Royden, who was in practice at Little Molton, a village about four miles from Moorcrest, received an urgent message from an old patient summoning him to Moorcrest.
Doctor Royden, jumping on his motor-bicycle, answered the summons at once. A terrible surprise awaited him.
Practically every inhabitant of the village, about a hundred people in all, were in the grip of a fearful and, so far as Doctor Royden’s knowledge went, wholly unknown malady.