The Mummy ceased to speak, and his features, which had appeared wild and animated during his conversation with Edric, became fixed—the unearthly lustre that had flashed from his eyes, faded away, and gave place to a glassy deadness—his limbs became rigid, and as the light of the lamp gradually sunk to less distinctness, the ghastly form of the Mummy seemed rapidly changing into stone. Edric felt that the moment when it was possible for him to hold communion with this strange being was rapidly passing away, and almost shrieked as he exclaimed, "One question! only one ere it be too late." The Mummy feebly raised his languid eyelids, but Edric felt his blood freeze at the unnatural glare. With a violent effort, however, he roused himself to speak. "Was it a human power that dragged you from the tomb?"
"The power that gave me life could alone restore it," replied the Mummy in slow measured accents, as it sank gradually back into its former tomb. Edric shuddered, and involuntarily rushed forward, but the Mummy no longer lived or breathed. Cold, pale, and inanimate it lay, as though its sleep of two thousand years had never been broken.
"Oblivion laid him down upon his hearse!"
and no mortal ever more could boast of holding converse with The Mummy.