"Come back, damn you!" he screamed. "Come back and tell me it's a lie!
"It must be a lie-it must-"
There was no sign of the vanished Arctarians now in the starlit sky. The darkness was brooding and intense around Woodin.
He screamed up again into the night, but only a whispering echo answered. Wild-eyed, staggering, soul-smitten, his gaze fell on the pistol in Ross's hand. He seized it with a hoarse cry.
The stillness of the forest was broken suddenly by a sharp crack that reverberated a moment and then died rapidly away. Then all was silent again save for the chuckling whisper of the river hurrying on.