His loss of memory, however, was of course only partial. He had forgotten his own identity, and all the people with whom he had so far in life had to do; yet at the same time he was dimly conscious that he had just left all these people, and that some day he would find them again. It was only the surface-layers of memory that had vanished, and these had not vanished for ever, but only sunk down a little below the horizon.
Then, presently, the children began to range themselves in rows between him and the opposite wall, without once taking their horrible, intelligent eyes off him as they moved. He watched them with growing dread, but at last his curiosity became so strong that it overcame everything else, and in a voice that he meant to be very brave, but that sounded hardly above a whisper, he said:
"Who are you? And what's been done to you?"
The answer came at once in a whisper as low as his own, though he could not distinguish who spoke:
"Listen and you shall know. You, too, are now one of us."
Immediately the children began a slow, impish sort of dance before him, moving almost with silent feet over the boards, yet with a sedateness and formality that had none of the unconscious grace of children. And, as they danced, they sang, but in voices so low, that it was more like the mournful sighing of wind among branches than human voices. It was the sound he had already heard outside the building.
"We are the children of the whispering night,
Who live eternally in dreadful fright
Of stories told us in the grey twilight
By—nurserymaids!
We are the children of a winter's day;
Under our breath we chant this mournful lay;
We dance with phantoms and with shadows play,
And have no rest.
We have no joy in any children's game,
For happiness to us is but a name,
Since Terror kissed us with his lips of flame
In wicked jest.