"But as I started to tell you, when Moonere and I finally clashed, my ray proved a failure--a fault I have corrected. I was seized and dragged down into the center of the temple. My clothes were torn from me, and I was thrown upon the altar. The crystal burned; the poison crept into my body. I thought that my time had arrived, that this would mean death. But that was not her plan. I was exposed only for a few brief moments, much the same as the convert who takes the final vows. Then I was released. Mind you, I was set free. I could go to the police and Scotland Yard if I wanted to. I could tell them my story." "Why didn't you?" "Do you think they would believe such a story? Furthermore, even if I took them to the temple, to the very altar, what could I prove? Upon the surface, Moonere has nothing that would arouse any suspicion beyond ordinary curiosity." "But your face--you were horribly disfigured after the exposure to the glass, were you not?" "No. That is not the way the glass first interprets the ray of Sudre. Those exposed to it for only a brief moment upon the altar, find that their youth, their physical charm, is doubly enhanced. When I was thrown from the temple, I looked years younger; my hair, which was turning gray before I entered, became black and glossy again. I could not look into a mirror without realizing the wonderful appearance that had been given to me. But it was only temporary. That is the way Moonere holds her victims for ever, sealing their lips, and bending them to unending servitude. The beauty does not last. Only by constant bathing in the rays beneath the glass can one keep fresh. Deny yourself those rays and the aid of Moonere, and you find your entire body slowly being destroyed. One look into the mirror, by a victim so denied, is enough to enslave the soul with fear. "Any night when the heavens are filled with the diffused rays of its many bodies, and Sudre is between earth and the planet about which it revolves, the torture of slowly being burned to a cinder increases for me. That is why I remain inside my home, which I have succeeded in partially insulating from them. That is why I can walk about in the fresh air upon only those all too few dark nights. In my home, I work with my inventions, the findings of many years of research by my family. But each night, Moonere and the Thing of Sudre send their rays to me. It is their jest, a further extension of their joy in the torture of mere mortals. My body now has an attraction for those rays. Even behind the closed, insulated walls, I feel their burn. With my present ray-machine, I have been combating them. Every night, if you could only see with your normal eyes the battle of Moonere's ray of death and my own discovered ray, you would know what a strange, unbelievable life I lead."