“Good God!” whispered Drake. “It was as though something reached up, broke those rays and drew them down--like threads.” “I saw it.” I struggled with bewilderment. “I saw it. But I never saw anything like it before,” I ended, most inadequately. “It was PURPOSEFUL,” he whispered. “It was DELIBERATE. As though something reached up, juggled with the rays, broke them, and drew them down like willow withes.” “The devils that dwell here!” quavered Chiu-Ming. “Some magnetic phenomenon.” I was half angry at myself for my own touch of panic. “Light can be deflected by passage through a magnetic field. Of course that's it. Certainly.” “I don't know.” Drake's tone was doubtful indeed. “It would take a whale of a magnetic field to have done THAT--it's inconceivable.” He harked back to his first idea. “It was so--so DAMNED deliberate,” he repeated. “Devils--” muttered the frightened Chinese. “What's that?” Drake gripped my arm and pointed to the north. A deeper blackness had grown there while we had been talking, a pool of darkness against which the mountain summits stood out, blade-sharp edges faintly luminous. A gigantic lance of misty green fire darted from the blackness and thrust its point into the heart of the zenith; following it, leaped into the sky a host of the sparkling spears of light, and now the blackness was like an ebon hand, brandishing a thousand javelins of tinseled flame. “The aurora,” I said. “It ought to be a good one,” mused Drake, gaze intent upon it. “Did you notice the big sun spot?” I shook my head. “The biggest I ever saw. Noticed it first at dawn this morning. Some little aurora lighter--that spot. I told you--look at that!” he cried. The green lances had fallen back. The blackness gathered itself together--then from it began to pulse billows of radiance, spangled with infinite darting swarms of flashing corpuscles like uncounted hosts of dancing fireflies. Higher the waves rolled--phosphorescent green and iridescent violet, weird copperous yellows and metallic saffrons and a shimmer of glittering ash of rose--then wavered, split and formed into gigantic, sparkling, marching curtains of splendor. A vast circle of light sprang out upon the folds of the flickering, rushing curtains. Misty at first, its edges sharpened until they rested upon the blazing glory of the northern sky like a pale ring of cold flame. And about it the aurora began to churn, to heap itself, to revolve. Toward the ring from every side raced the majestic folds, drew themselves together, circled, seethed around it like foam of fire about the lip of a cauldron, and poured through the shining circle as though it were the mouth of that fabled cavern where old Aeolus sits blowing forth and breathing back the winds that sweep the earth. Yes--into the ring's mouth the aurora flew, cascading in a columned stream to earth. Then swiftly, a mist swept over all the heavens, veiled that incredible cataract. “Magnetism?” muttered Drake. “I guess NOT!”