Yet either I must have spoken or (yes, the miracle was no less
likely!) she heard my thoughts; for she lifted her head and, rising,
came towards me. As she drew close, her form appeared to expand,
shutting out the light . . . and I drifted back into darkness.
By-and-by the light glimmered again. I seemed to be rising to it,
this time, like a drowned man out of deep water; drowned, not
drowning, for I felt no struggle, but rather stood apart from my body
and watched it ascending, the arms held downwards, rigid, the palms
touching its thighs--until at the surface, on the top of a wave, my
will rejoined it and forced it to look. Then I knew that I had been
mistaken. The sky was there, deep as a well; and, as before, it
shone through an opening; and the opening had a rounded top like the
arch of a window; yet it was not a window. As before, my love sat
between me and the light, and the light shone through her. My bed
rocked a little under me, and for a while I fancied myself on board
the _Gauntlet_, laid in my bunk and listening to the rolling of her
loose ballast--until my ear distinguished and recognized the sound
for that of wheels, a low rumble through which a horse's footfall
plodded, beating time.
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