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It is nothing more than a melted head and it drags itself along with small hands that have sprung from its monstrous face. It weeps, forming words that are almost familar. It obeys not even its own master, but tiptoes after it in mocking submission to the mocking god whose form it bears. And the fiend that haunts the mountain-top shivers when it hears these things, for it has once shivered at the shrill piping of the great black cat outside the black door. The next morning the loungers at the inn are told that the ill-built and ancient stone staircase leading down from the cot is impassable. So instead of blaming the departing servants or quitting altogether, the company does what any sane person would do and arranges to have a stout rope lowered and lowered till finally it rests on the dripping stones of the mountain-top. Early the next evening a well-drilled party cuts a little swath down the mountain's slope, finding it without abnormalities either in material or in fancy. There is no evidence of human feet in sight, and the party is satisfied that those outside made the ascent. But they leave it to night--for who can say what has become of the old and feared squatting a church.