CHAPTER XXXIX

THAT NIGHT

Their night was a troubled one, and they brought a strange report
of it into the day. Whether the fear of their sleep came out into
their waking, or their waking fear sank with them into their dreams,
awake or asleep they were never at rest from it. All night something
seemed going on in the house--something silent, something terrible,
something they were not to know. Never a sound awoke; the darkness
was one with the silence, and the silence was the terror.

Once, a frightful wind filled the house, and shook its inside, they
said, so that it quivered and trembled like a horse shaking himself;
but it was a silent wind that made not even a moan in their chamber,
and passed away like a soundless sob.

They fell asleep. But they woke again with a great start. They
thought the house was filling with water such as they had been
drinking. It came from below, and swelled up until the garret was
full of it to the very roof. But it made no more sound than the
wind, and when it sank away, they fell asleep dry and warm.

The next time they woke, all the air, they said, inside and out,
was full of cats. They swarmed--up and down, along and across,
everywhere about the room. They felt their claws trying to get