47786 'We must close in on him rapidly, for he is said to be a desperate fellow.
47787 We shall take him by surprise and have him at our mercy before he can resist.'
47788 'I say, Watson,' said the baronet, 'what would Holmes say to this?
47789 How about that hour of darkness in which the power of evil is exalted?'
47790 As if in answer to his words there rose suddenly out of the vast gloom of the moor that strange cry which I had already heard upon the borders of the great Grimpen Mire.
47791 It came with the wind through the silence of the night, a long, deep mutter, then a rising howl, and then the sad moan in which it died away.
47792 Again and again it sounded, the whole air throbbing with it, strident, wild, and menacing.
47793 The baronet caught my sleeve, and his face glimmered white through the darkness.
47794 'Good heavens, what's that, Watson?'
47795 'I don't know.
47796 It's a sound they have on the moor.
47797 I heard it once before.'
47798 It died away, and an absolute silence closed in upon us.
47799 We stood straining our ears, but nothing came.