Malcolm Ross, a young barrister, is awakened in the middle of the night and summoned to the house of famous Egyptologist Abel Trelawny at the request of his daughter, Margaret, with whom Malcolm is enamored. Once Malcolm arrives at the house, he meets Margaret, Superintendent Dolan, and Doctor Winchester, and learns why he has been called: Margaret, hearing strange noises from her father's bedroom, woke to find him unconscious and bloodied on the floor of his room, under some sort of trance.