"Sufficient?" cried Roberta. "That seems far too much power to me!"
The professor ignored her, and he crossed to the shelf where he'd deposited the attracting machine earlier. He took it up carefully, using both hands, and carried it to the generator with all the solemnity of a midwife handling a newborn. He laid it down on the workbench, and proceeded to attach the first of the two electrical cables.
"Father!" shouted Roberta. "Let me slow the lathe a little."
During my brief period of employment with the Twickhams I had come to view the professor as an impatient sort, little given to lengthy deliberations even when his life was in mortal danger. Such proved the case in this instance, for he ignored his daughter's advice and connected the second cable to the attractor machine without a moment's hesitation.
Instantly, the clear gem at the heart of the device glared like the midday sun, bathing that dank, grimy cellar with an unnaturally bright light. I shielded my eyes, as did Roberta, while the professor, who was standing so much closer, squinted through his fingers. At that moment all of us saw the exact same thing. The segmented orange shape began to spin, faster and faster, and as it did so the light gleaming from the gem began to turn to the deepest, darkest night.
This darkness quickly spread throughout the cellar, much like a bottle of ink tipped into a pool of water. Now, instead of shielding our eyes, we were forced to peer into the gloom just to make each other out. As my eyes grew accustomed I realised the darkness was not complete, for it was shot through with shimmering waves of violet and dark red.
Roberta waited no longer. She pushed upwards with all her might on the handle controlling the lathe. The thick band driving the machine slowed and stopped, but to my astonishment the lathe did not. Indeed, the machine now seemed to be powered by the spin of the generator rather than the other way around. The generator was no longer turning motion from the lathe into electricity, it was receiving energy from Lord knows where and using it to spin the lathe!
Roberta pulled on the handle and then raised it once more, but to no effect. Then, in the near-darkness, I saw that the cables leading from the generator to the attractor machine were glowing red. The latter was still spinning, emitting that strange black light, and I wondered whether it was drawing power from some hitherto unimagined spirit world and sending that power to the generator. In effect, the attractor device had turned the generator into an electric motor of sorts!
The workbench had been shaking wildly under the immense rotational forces, and all of a sudden the brackets I'd fashioned gave up the struggle. One of them snapped, and a split second later the generator spun free, tearing away from the connecting cables to smash against the wall. There was a shower of hot metal fragments, and I ducked as the spinning shaft flew past my ear with a loud humming noise. There was a crash behind me as it hit the wall, and further patterings of metal as bits and pieces of the ruined generator came to rest.
Meanwhile, the two cables attached to the attractor where whipping around in mid-air like angry snakes, sparking and crackling every time the ends approached each other. The professor was almost caught once or twice, and he stepped back hurriedly to avoid injury.
The attractor was still spinning wildly, with no signs of slowing, and the gem was now turning to a dark purplish colour. Now and again there was a flash of blood red lightning, and one of these narrowly missed the professor before striking a cupboard pushed against the wall. There was a bang, and a hole the size of my fist appeared in the wooden door.
"Shut it down!" screamed Roberta. "Shut it down before it does for us!"
The professor turned a ghastly look on her. "I agree with you wholeheartedly, my dear. But… how?"
Chapter 30
Bolts of red lightning speared out of the attractor machine, striking walls and furniture alike, and for the first time in my life I understood what it might be like to face enemy fire. The professor was much closer to the machine than I, and far more likely to be hit, but he appeared incapable of movement. It was as though the strange lights and bursts of energy emanating from his machine were too shocking for him to comprehend, and so he could only stand there staring foolishly at the thing.
Roberta had no such trouble. She leapt from her position at the other end of the lathe, dodging forks of deadly red lightning as she made for her father. Upon reaching him she spared no time for niceties, instead dragging him bodily away from the madly spinning device.
Even as they withdrew, a ghostly, insubstantial shape began to emerge from the attractor. At first it was a twisted hand, with long fingers and ragged nails, and to my horror I realised this hand was twice the size of any I had seen before. The hand appeared to be clawing at the air, like a drowning man striving to reach the surface, and soon a second hand joined the first. Then a face appeared, its features horribly stretched. The head turned this way and that as though struggling to breathe, the distorted, gaping mouth exhibiting teeth like tombstones. A thick tongue protruded from the mouth, flailing around like a freshly beheaded snake, and as I gazed in horror upon this apparition I suddenly realised it had seen me.
The spirit fastened me with a hungry look, and it redoubled its efforts to free itself, desperately trying to enter our world so that it might rend the very soul from my living body. I was frozen to the spot, completely unable to move, but out
