The little place was deserted in the hold of the forest. It
lay like a lonely, luminous raft, in the midst of a black sea. Only
ahead of me a man stumbled slowly in the center of the road, and his
shadow staggered beside him. I have said there was no other living
thing visible. Yet, as this man stumbled past the shuttered houses
the very blades of grass, the very leaves on the wall, seemed to have
conscious life and to be aware of him. When the wind moved the trees,
every branch seemed to be straining to follow him as Pedro and I
followed.
"We followed, but we could not gain on him. It was like the dreams of
delirium. Pedro and I seemed to be struggling through the silence of
Herares as if it were something heavy and resistant, and Scott reeled
from side to side, but always kept the same distance ahead. We were
still behind when we turned into Henkel's garden, and the scent of the
flowers beat in our faces like heat. At the veranda steps we met the
servant who had admitted Scott.
"The man was running away. He was a cripple, and he came down the
steps doubled up, bundled past us, and was gone. Somewhere a door
clashed open. There was no other sound. But in a moment the garden
seemed, full of stampeding servants, all maimed, or ill, or aged. They
melted silently into the bushes as rats melt into brushwood, and they
took no notice of us. I heard Pedro catch his breath quickly. But when
a light flared up in one of the rooms it showed no more than Scott
talking with Henkel.
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