Whatever it was, it was coming to life; that same savage, predatory life which had made a madhouse of my apartment the past two nights. My head reeled from the very strain of listening to the silence which followed that long sigh.
Finally there came another sigh, followed by a loud creak; then a muffled, shuddering sound as of a breath abruptly choked; another creak which could have come from no place other than the comer where I had placed that fiend-haunted table.
It was high time to awaken my companions. By dint of shaking them by the shoulders, I did succeed in arousing them from the stupor into which they had fallen; and it was several minutes before I could make them understand what was going on.
The noises in the comer had by this time entirely ceased. Again there was a long, oppressive silence; and it was not until 1, or perhaps half past—I had lost track of time, and a single stroke of the hall clock told me nothing—when there came another sigh, then another creak, and then a persistent, muffled throbbing, like the pulsing of African war-drums from a great distance: that same ominous, brooding thump-thump that had haunted me the past two nights; that solemn, fateful, deliberate beating that speaks of war and massacre and the devices of jungle devil-doctors.
I felt Paul grip me by the arm. And under any other circumstances I would have chuckled at the thought of those two pronounced skeptics getting their first taste of that bloodthirsty presence which had made a slaughter-house of my drawing-room.
More sighs and creaks, impressed on that terrifying crescendo of muffled pulsing; and then a rapid, irregular pounding, as if the table were rocking to and fro in great agitation, balancing first on one leg, then another.
“What the deuce can that be?” muttered Mark, as he rose from his seat.
The noises in the corner grew louder and louder; the clattering and jarring were succeeded by terrific thumps, just as if the table, trying to rise from the floor, were falling back each time it made the attempt.
And then I realized that my own muscles were contracting in sympathy with the efforts of this unseen monster, as if to help it set itself in motion! That last heave of my shoulders and leaning forward of my body seemed through the intervening space to have given it the final lift needed to set it lurching forward, moving across the room with a succession of bumps and thuds.
A yell of amazement from the usually cool and phlegmatic Mark; he too had felt the sorcery of that wooden demon. And then: "I'll stop you and get to the bottom of this trickery!"
The table leaped furiously, bounding in a mad rush to meet Mark's charge; then a series of bumps, snorts, and Mark's heavy breathing.
Paul and I sat in a stupor, terrified by this outrageous and impossible combat whose progress we could follow all too readily by the succession of thumps and crashes that marked its course about the room.
"Help! The damned thing's killing me!" shrieked Mark. And wrenched from our stupor by his shout of terror, we leaped to his assistance.
We found ourselves fighting for our lives. The thing we grappled, and from whose frenzy we sought to rescue Mark, seemed no longer a table, but a writhing, frantic beast of prey. We could feel it pulsating under our touch, hear it gasping and snarling as a creature in the throes of a desperate struggle. It was no longer wooden, but alive, vibrant with an outlandish, murderous force
