Alexander Roby's release hearing takes place in Hereford on the morning of November 30th. The investigators attend at Dr Highsmith's invitation. With Ludwig's medical opinion, the hearing is a mere formality and Alexander is released to convalescent care. Graham Roby also attends, but does not acknowledge the investigators.

Dr Highsmith is pleased. He has already arranged a place for Alexander in a good convalescent home and a ambulance to take him there. After a quick telephone call to order the transfer he takes the investigators to lunch in a nearby restaurant, where he talks psychoanalysis for a good hour and a half. They return to London that afternoon, rather wearied by the experience, although Ludwig is somewhat consoled by an offer of co-authorship on Dr Highsmith's planned monograph.

The next morning Ludwig receives a telephone call from a rather agitated Dr Highsmith. The ambulance never arrived at the convalescent home: Alexander is missing, along with the ambulance driver and the nurse assigned to take care of him during the transfer. He is afraid for the reputation of his asylum and needs the investigators help. Can they visit him today? The investigators oblige, although they are not sure how exactly they can help. A meeting with Dr Highsmith does little to answer this question. He has already contacted the police, but fears they are not taking the case seriously enough. Alexander was still heavily sedated and barely aware of his surroundings. The ambulance driver was a longstanding employee of the hospital at Hereford. The nurse, Evans, although one of his most reliable staff, seems like the least unlikely candidate for foul play of some kind. He has a key to Evan's house in a nearby town, and would like the investigators to conduct a search in the company of the local police before they become fixated on the idea of a "dangerous lunatic on the loose".

The investigators meet with Sgt. Brown at the Leominster police station. He seems as skeptical as they are, but accompanies them to Evan's rented house in one of the quieter residential areas. The house is empty of everything but the furnishings; Evans had obviously planned this disappearance. Still, two significant discoveries remain. There two letters on the mat: a gas bill addressed to Michael Evans, and a note from the British Library informing Montague Edwards that his application for renewal of his reader's ticket has been received. Disturbingly, the floorboards in the bathroom are dark and spongy. They have been saturated with what Sgt. Brown identifies as dried blood. There is no question now that the police will take the case seriously.

Questioning the old lady next door reveals little useful information. "Evans" was a nice, helpful man who worked three weeks on and one week off. He had friends in London and sometimes went down for a day or two in his off week. Last week, he made several trips into town carrying a big suitcase, but said nothing about it. Perhaps he was short of money and visiting the pawnbrokers? Dr Highsmith has little else to add. Evans arrived with good references from a London hospital a few months after Alexander was committed. He was a reliable worker whose only lapse was giving Alexander the pencils with which he wrote in the margins of his books.

Before returning to London, the investigators call Vincent Tuck and ask him to put a watch on Bacon's house. This proves useless. The police have linked Bacon to their investigation of the shots heard in the warehouse district and are searching his house. There are police constantly on duty outside.

The next week or so passes in the investigation of dead ends. Georgina speaks to Alexander's former fiancee, Delia Morrison. She is unaware of Alexander's disappearance and seems preoccupied with her own unhappy marriage, but promises to inform the investigators if she hears anything. Enquiries at the British Library reveal that Edwards' ticket was first issued in 1907, with a tutor at the Slade School of Fine Art as guarantor. Renewal records show an unpromising selection of temporary addresses. Study of the Bacon's notebooks yields evidence of a rift between Bacon, Edwards, and Quarrie and suggests that Edwards intends to make another attempt at whatever was tried and failed at Clare Melford in 1925.

On the night of December 7th, Georgina and Aubrey experience more disturbing dreams and Alex finds himself on the Embankment facing freshly-painted graffiti that reads: "HIS NAME IS WRITTEN IN THE BLACK SKY". The next morning, Georgina receives a letter from Delia. It seems that Alexander wrote to her at her old home address; her mother has only just forwarded the note, which she encloses. Alexander is going to Edwards' house on Loch Mullardoch, and invites Delia to join him. Consulting the Ordnance Survey maps at a local library, the investigators find Loch Mullardoch to the southwest of Inverness. There is a Mullardoch House on the eastern shore, reached by a track from the nearby village of Cannich. The next day they board the eight o'clock train to Inverness, taking warm clothing, a selection of relevant books, and two revolvers.

The rail journey is eleven hours, which the investigators pass in study. At Manchester, a nervous-looking man asks to join them. Glancing at their books, he introduces himself rather hesitantly as Mr Lister and asks if they are expecting to be met at Inverness. He is toying nervously with something at his neck: a whistle of a kind familiar to the investigators. Smoothly covering Aubrey's reflexive denial, Alex assures him that they are.

Mr Lister is a small man with a nervous manner that verges on mania, and his conversation is frequently interrupted by tics, worried remarks, and checks that the corridor outside is empty. He is a drill-press operator from Manchester, but his real vocation is of course a seeker of truth. He knows Edwards and Bacon by name but has never met them; he finds it difficult to get down to London. A few days ago, he received word of a gathering of fellow-seekers in Scotland. They were to be met by cars at Inverness, but he was unavoidably delayed and hopes he is not too late. He thinks there are about twenty seekers in total. The last such meeting was about three years ago, in a village down South, but he was unable to attend.

The conversation flags. Aubrey spots a copy of "The Wanderer by the Lake" in Lister's bag and displays his own. What is his opinion, he wonders, of the enigmatic final pages? Lister becomes suddenly calm. Those passages, he says, can bring a true vision. Would Aubrey care to try? Aubrey agrees, and they read certain passages in German aloud and trace a Yellow Sign in the air with their fists. For several minutes, Aubrey finds himself climbing a bare mountainside in the evening. The air is thin and he is tired. His companions are behind him. He reaches the top a ridge and sees a valley before him. It is dry, but a few scrubby bushes grow at the bottom and stones mark the side of an old campfire. The far side of the valley is a cliff-face with carved openings. Abruptly, he is back in the railway carriage. To the others, no time has passed.

When questioned, Lister says that he too has experienced a vision but cannot recall the details. He becomes nervous again, and wanders into the corridor. After ten minutes or so of nervous pacing he announces that he is worried about the people in the next compartment (an aggressively respectable Scottish family with two well-behaved children) and intends to move to a different carriage.

At Inverness, the investigators attempt to follow Lister but are stymied by the absence of any cars to meet him and the evident fact that he does not know where to go. Taking the porter's advice, they hire a car from a nearby garage and set off for Mullardoch, taking Lister with them. Aubrey, as the only one with any driving experience, takes the wheel.

The road south from Inverness has been gritted, and the drive to Cannich goes quickly. The track from Cannich to the loch, on the other hand, is snow over packed ice and only barely drivable. They will be lucky to manage the final part of the journey in less than four hours. At about the halfway point, the car slides off the road. While hauling it out of the ditch, the investigators notice creaking a cracking sounds from the surrounding trees. The night is still, but they are all tilting towards the loch, as if blown by a strong wind.

About half an hour later, a shadow falls over the car. Something is overhead. Looking up, the investigators see a gigantic mottled yellow and white thing the size of a whale. Its form is fluid, like a jellyfish made of rags, and it moves silently through the air with a pulsing motion. Long tatters trail behind it like tentacles. Aubrey recognizes it from his dreams and is struck with the fear that it will notice him. Stopping the car, he is lost to the others for some time, consenting only to be lead at a gentle walking pace. Lister is beatific. "It is one of His heralds," he says, "Follow me. All is well." He leaves the car and begins to walk down the road. A few hundred yards ahead, he turns off and is lost from sight.

Following at a safe distance, the investigators find a short track that leads to a small clearing in the forest. In the centre of the clearing is a granite monolith like the ones they saw at Clare Melford. Lister watches raptly while the flying thing tethers itself to the monolith with its ragged tentacles. "All is well. Follow me." he repeats, and starts off down the road again. The investigators continue to follow him on foot, keeping a safe distance. After about an hour, Aubrey comes to his senses and prudently insists that they should return to the car, go back to Inverness, and call the police. The others disagree, feeling that they have come too far to turn back now, and there are several minutes of heated discussion by the end of which Lister has vanished from sight. Finally, they continue on the road to the Loch, reluctantly accompanied by Aubrey.

About an hour later they emerge from the woods and begin to descend to the Loch. Mullardoch House is visible at the end of the track. It proves to be a rather modest stone hunting-lodge, with several cars parked outside. As they descend, however, a thick mist begins to roll in from the Loch and the house is soon lost from sight. As they continue, a building looms out of the mist: a monumental arch of some kind, like the one at Hyde Park Corner. The mist clears, and other buildings are visible around them. They are in a city street, looking down on a lake and the palace beyond it. Two suns are setting. Carcosa has found them.