For a few minutes longer, I waited there, listening; but, after the first general outcry, I heard nothing.  I knew, now, that there was no more reason to fear an attack from this quarter.  I had removed the only means of reaching the window, and, as none of the other windows had any adjacent water pipes, to tempt the climbing powers of the monsters, I began to feel more confident of escaping their clutches.

Leaving the room, I made my way down to the study.  I was anxious to see how the door had withstood the test of that last assault.  Entering, I lit two of the candles, and then turned to the door.  One of the large props had been displaced, and, on that side, the door had been forced inward some six inches.

It was Providential that I had managed to drive the brutes away just when I did!  And that copingstone!  I wondered, vaguely, how I had managed to dislodge it.  I had not noticed it loose, as I took my shot; and then, as I stood up, it had slipped away from beneath me ...  I felt that I owed the dismissal of the attacking force, more to its timely fall than to my rifle.  Then the thought came, that I had better seize this chance to shore up the door, again.  It was evident that the creatures had not returned since the fall of the copingstone; but who was to say how long they would keep away?

There and then, I set-to, at repairing the door—­working hard and anxiously.  First, I went down to the basement, and, rummaging ’round, found several pieces of heavy oak planking.  With these, I returned to the study, and, having removed the props, placed the planks up against the door.  Then, I nailed the heads of the struts to these, and, driving them well home at the bottoms, nailed them again there.

Thus, I made the door stronger than ever; for now it was solid with the backing of boards, and would, I felt convinced, stand a heavier pressure than hitherto, without giving way.

After that, I lit the lamp which I had brought from the kitchen, and went down to have a look at the lower windows.

Now that I had seen an instance of the strength the creatures possessed, I felt considerable anxiety about the windows on the ground floor—­in spite of the fact that they were so strongly barred.

I went first to the buttery, having a vivid remembrance of my late adventure there.  The place was chilly, and the wind, soughing in through the broken glass, produced an eerie note.  Apart from the general air of dismalness, the place was as I had left it the night before.  Going up to the window, I examined the bars, closely; noting, as I did so, their comfortable thickness.  Still, as I looked more intently, it seemed to me, that the middle bar was bent slightly from the straight; yet it was but trifling, and it might have been so for years.  I had never, before, noticed them particularly.