All at once it came to him, the dream he had dreamed. _He_ had been bending over the microscope, _he_ had been looking into the unseen world, and the horror of what he had seen gripped him now and brought out the chill sweat on his body. For he had seen his son there in the clouded water, among the twisted glassy plants, his face turned upward and eyes wide in the agonized appeal of the drowning; and bubbles rising, fading. But around him had been a swarm of the weird creatures, and they had been dragging him down, down, blurring out of focus, and their great dark eyes glistening wetly, coldly.... He was sitting rigid at his desk, his work forgotten; all at once he saw the clock and noticed with a start that it was already eleven a.m. A fear he could not define seized on him, and his hand reached spasmodically for the telephone on his desk. But before he touched it, it began ringing. After a moment’s paralysis, he picked up the receiver. It was his wife’s voice that came shrilly over the wires. "Henry!" she cried. "Is that you?" "Hello, Sally," he said with stiff lips. Her voice as she answered seemed to come nearer and go farther away, and he realized that his hand holding the instrument was shaking. "Henry, you’ve got to come home right now. Harry’s sick. He’s got a high fever, and he’s been asking for you." He moistened his lips and said, "I’ll be right home. I’ll take a taxi." "Hurry!" she exclaimed. "He’s been saying queer things. I think he’s delirious." She paused, and added, "And it’s all the fault of that microscope _you_ bought him!" "I’ll be right home," he repeated dully. ———— His wife was not at the door to meet him; she must be upstairs, in Harry’s bedroom. He paused in the living room and glanced toward the table that bore the microscope; the black, gleaming thing still stood there, but he did not see any of the slides, and the papers were piled neatly together to one side. His eyes fell on the fish bowl; it was empty, clean and shining. He knew Harry hadn’t done those things; that was Sally’s neatness. Abruptly, instead of going straight up the stairs, he moved to the table and looked down at the pile of papers. The one on top was almost blank; on it was written several times: rty34pr ... rty34pr.... His memory for figure combinations served him; he remembered what had been written on another page: "rty34pr is the pond." That made him think of the pond, lying quiescent under its green scum and trailing plants at the end of the garden. A step on the stair jerked him around. It was his wife, of course. She said in a voice sharp-edged with apprehension: "What are you doing down here? Harry wants you. The doctor hasn’t come; I phoned him just before I called you, but he hasn’t come." He did not answer. Instead he gestured at the pile of papers, the empty fish bowl, an imperative question in his face.