The voice ceased and the sound died away. Something about the face and figure of Colonel Wragge relaxed, I thought. The terrible look passed from his face. The Being that obsessed him was gone.

“The great Ritual,” said Dr. Silence aside to me, very low, “the Book of the Dead. Now it’s leaving him. Soon the blood will fashion it a body.”

Colonel Wragge, who had stood absolutely motionless all this time, suddenly swayed, so that I thought he was going to fall⁠—and, but for the quick support of the doctor’s arm, he probably would have fallen, for he staggered as in the beginning of collapse.

“I am drunk with the wine of Osiris,” he cried⁠—and it was half with his own voice this time⁠—“but Horus, the Eternal Watcher, is about my path⁠—for⁠—safety.” The voice dwindled and failed, dying away into something almost like a cry of distress.