It was this, as much as anything, that gave people courage, and I
suppose the new arrivals from Woking also helped to restore
confidence.  At any rate, as the dusk came on a slow, intermittent
movement upon the sand pits began, a movement that seemed to gather
force as the stillness of the evening about the cylinder remained
unbroken.  Vertical black figures in twos and threes would advance,
stop, watch, and advance again, spreading out as they did so in a thin
irregular crescent that promised to enclose the pit in its attenuated
horns.  I, too, on my side began to move towards the pit.