“‘Hush! hush! did you hear?’
“‘What’s the matter?’ cried I, jumping up in surprise.
“‘Hush! someone calling—calling me!’
“Again that strange fancy! What did it mean? I could not repress a certain thrill at the heart as I gazed at her. It was very weird and strange.
“As I gazed, a singular change crept over her. Her face was now quite colourless, and its pallor was intensified by the blackness of her mystical eyes. Those eyes slowly grew fixed—immovable, as if frozen. The lids trembled for a moment, then drooped, then lifted again to their widest extent, and so remained. Her lips, slightly parted, showed the white teeth set edge to edge behind them. The rigidity descended through her whole body; she was like a marble statue. She breathed low and deeply, as one who is in profound slumber.
“‘Kate, what has happened to you?’ I cried in alarm, putting my hand on her shoulder. Her arm was fixed like iron; she seemed to hear nothing, feel nothing. She was as much beyond any power of mine to influence her as if she had been dead. The diamonds that glittered on her bosom were not more insensible than she.
“I must confess that I was somewhat unnerved by the situation. Kate was evidently in some sort of trance; but what had put her into that state, and how was she to be got out of it? For aught I knew, it might be the prelude to a fit or other seizure of that nature, involving consequences dangerous if not fatal. In the bewilderment of the moment the only remedy that I could think of was cold water; to dash her with water might be of use, and could scarcely make matters worse. About thirty paces from where we were standing a small rill meandered amongst the roots of the trees, and trickled at last in a tiny cascade down the rocky side of the gorge. Towards this I ran, and stooping down, attempted to scoop up some of the refreshing element in the crown of my straw hat.
“Rising with the dripping hat in my hands, I turned to go back; but the sight that then met my eyes caused me to drop everything and spring forward with a gasp of horror.
“Moving as if in obedience to some power external or at least foreign to herself, as a mechanical figure might move, steadily, deliberately, and yet blindly, Kate had advanced directly towards the narrow chasm, and when I first beheld her she already seemed balancing on the brink. Before I could cover half the distance that separated us, she had set foot on the long beam which spanned the abyss, and had begun to walk along it. By the time I reached the hither end, she was halfway over, stepping as unconsciously as if she were on an ordinary sidewalk, though the slightest deflection from a straight course would have sent her down a hundred feet to the jagged boulders below.
“Standing on the hither verge, every nerve so tensely strung that I seemed to hear the blood humming through my brain, I watched the passage of those small feet, which I had admired that morning as they peeped coquettishly from beneath her dress in the railway carriage—I watched them pass, step after step, along that awful beam. I suppose the transit must have been accomplished in less than a minute, but it seemed to me that I was watching it for hours. I uttered no sound, lest it might rouse her from her trance and insure the catastrophe that else she might escape; I did not attempt to overtake her, fearful lest the beam should fail to support our united weight. I saw her pass on, rigid, unbending, but sure of foot as a rope-dancer; and at last I saw her reach the opposite side, and stand once more on solid earth, preserved from death as it seemed by a miracle. I have no distinct recollection of how I followed; I only know that a few seconds afterwards I was standing beside her, with my arm round her waist.