‘Something of what kind?’
‘Some kind of—beetle. I could hear the whirring of its wings; I could hear its droning in the air; I knew that it was hovering above my head; that it was coming lower and lower, nearer and nearer. I hid myself; I covered myself all over with the clothes,—then I felt it bumping against the coverlet. And, Sydney!’ She drew closer. Her blanched cheeks and frightened eyes made my heart bleed. Her voice became but an echo of itself. ‘It followed me.’
‘Marjorie!’
‘It got into the bed.’
‘You imagined it.’
‘I didn’t imagine it. I heard it crawl along the sheets, till it found a way between them, and then it crawled towards me. And I felt it—against my face.—And it’s there now.’
‘Where?’
She raised the forefinger of her left hand.
‘There!—Can’t you hear it droning?’
She listened, intently. I listened too. Oddly enough, at that instant the droning of an insect did become audible.