The voice of the story-teller was beyond the reach of
hearing; and I was falling with ever increasing rapidity through an
immense void.
A sound of whispering roused me. Two persons were talking under their
breath close beside me. The words in the main escaped me, but I caught
every now and then bitten-off phrases and half sentences, to which,
however, I could attach no intelligible meaning. The words were quite
close--at my very side in fact--and one of the voices sounded so
familiar, that curiosity overcame dread, and I turned to look. I was not
mistaken; _it was Shorthouse whispering_. But the other person, who must
have been just a little beyond him, was lost in the darkness and
invisible to me. It seemed then that Shorthouse at once turned up his
face and looked at me and, by some means or other that caused me no
surprise at the time, I easily made out the features in the darkness.
They wore an expression I had never seen there before; he seemed
distressed, exhausted, worn out, and as though he were about to give in
after a long mental struggle. He looked at me, almost beseechingly, and
the whispering of the other person died away.
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