And no wonder, after
such a night!
In that awful trance, when I had sat with my face buried on
Winifred's breast, not only had the physiognomy of the cove, but
every circumstance of our lives together, been photographed in my
brain in one picture of fire. When, after the concentrated agony of
those first moments of tension, I looked up into Winifred's face, as
though awakening from a dream, my flesh had 'appeared,' she told me,
'grey and wizened, like the flesh of an old man.' The mental and
physical effects of this were now gathering around me and upon me.
From a painful slumber I awoke in about an hour with red-heat at my
brain and with a sickening dread at my heart. 'It is fever,' thought
I; 'I am going to be ill; and what is there to do in the morning at
the ebb of the tide before Winifred can go upon the sands? I ought
not to have come home at all,' I said. 'Suppose illness were to
seize me and prevent my getting there?' The dreadful thought alone
paralysed me quite. Under it I lay as under a nightmare. I scarcely
dared try to get out of bed, lest I should find my fears
well-grounded.
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