The True and Indisputable Facts in the Matter of the Ram's Skull (short story)

Summary
Author Edgar Allen Poe and a number of other guests attend a séance at the house of Mr R____, who has promised a surprise for the evening. Amongst the other visitors are an unnamed doctor, his friends Ian and Barbara, and Miss Allardyce and her sullen young ward Abigail, who has the gift of second sight. Drinks are served, and the visitors enter a back room where they sit in a circle around a table on which has been placed a ram’s skull with a pentagram carved upon its forehead. At Mr R____’s request, the visitors all focus their attention on the skull, and all become transfixed in place as the flesh begins to seep out of Abigail’s body and onto the skull, creating a hideous demonic visage. Abigail chortles evilly, possessed by an evil force attempting to reincorporate itself, and the Doctor manages to fling his cognac over the skull but is then paralysed, unable to move further. Realising what the Doctor intended, Poe manages to knock over the candle next to him, and the skull -- and Abigail -- both burst into flame. The others’ paralysis is broken, but, knowing that Abigail is beyond rescue, the Doctor stops the others from saving her and lets her burn. He bids a sad farewell to Poe, who, shaken by his experience, returns home and sets it down on paper... but realises too late that in doing so he has opened another gateway through which the evil may manifest itself. The next day, Poe is found wandering deliriously in the streets of Baltimore, and is taken to a hospital where he dies four days later. Shortly after his burial a mysterious figure leaves roses and cognac on his grave.

Characters
First Doctor

Ian

Barbara

Continuity
to be added