They swung rapidly downhill. Siegmund still shuddered, but not so uncontrollably. They came to a stile which they must climb. As he stepped over it needed a concentrated effort of will to place his foot securely on the step. The effort was so great that he became conscious of it.
“Good Lord!” he said to himself. “I wonder what it is.”
He tried to examine himself. He thought of all the organs of his body—his brain, his heart, his liver. There was no pain, and nothing wrong with any of them, he was sure. His dim searching resolved itself into another detached phrase. “There is nothing the matter with me,” he said.
Then he continued vaguely wondering, recalling the sensation of wretched sickness which sometimes follows drunkenness, thinking of the times when he had fallen ill.
“But I am not like that,” he said, “because I don’t feel tremulous. I am sure my hand is steady.”
Helena stood still to consider the road. He held out his hand before him. It was motionless as a dead flower on this silent night.
“Yes, I think this is the right way,” said Helena, and they set off again, as if gaily.
“It certainly feels rather deathly,” said Siegmund to himself. He remembered distinctly, when he was a child and had diphtheria, he had stretched himself in the horrible sickness, which he felt was—and here he chose the French word—“l’agonie”. But his mother had seen and had cried aloud, which suddenly caused him to struggle with all his soul to spare her her suffering.
“Certainly it is like that,” he said. “Certainly it is rather deathly. I wonder how it is.”
Then he reviewed the last hour.