His bed was hard; the bed-clothes had slipped off. He tried to pull them round him. His groping hand found nothing but impossible lumps, and stuff that trickled between his fingers. Why was he naked? where was his night-shirt? and what was this small hard thing he clutched in his hand?
With a puzzled frown he opened his eyes.
Overhead rose a dim white wall, a thin curtain swaying before it. At first he took it for the white-washed wall of his attic at home, the lace-curtains at the head of the bed blowing in the wind. Then a slow-winged shadow, passing between him and the ceiling with puling cry, startled him to the truth.
The memories surged back on him. He knew.
That white wall sheer above him was the cliff; that swaying curtain was the mist; that passing shadow a sea-bird. The hard something he was clutching so jealously was the scent-bottle; this still thing at his side was—
The thought stabbed him awake. He sat up with a start.
About him drifted a white and waving mist. It shrouded him, chilly as a winding-sheet. There was no shore, no sea—only a hiss and rustle in the silence; and this still thing at his feet.
"Sir!" he gasped.
The still thing did not answer him.
The body leapt to his feet. He was alone; alone for ever in a blank universe where nothing was—but the still thing!