had finished eating and had
also risen to his feet, beckoned him to come close.

"That is the road we came by?" said Berselius, pointing over the country
toward the west.

"Yes," said Adams, "that is the road."

"Do you see the skyline?" said Berselius.

"Yes, I see the skyline."

"Well, my memory carries me to the skyline, but not beyond."

"Oh, Lord!" said Adams to himself, "here he is beginning it all over
again!"

"I can remember," said Berselius, "everything that happened as far as my
eye carries me. For instance, by that tree a mile away a porter fell down.
He was very exhausted. And when we had passed that ridge near the skyline
we saw two birds fighting; two bald-headed vultures----"

"That is so," said Adams.

"But beyond the skyline," said Berselius, suddenly becoming excited and
clutching his companion's arm, "I see nothing. I know nothing. All is
mist--all is mist."

"Yes, yes," said the surgeon. "It's only memory blindness. It will come
back."

"Ah, but will it? If I can get to the skyline and see the country beyond,
and if I remember that, and if I go on and on, the way we came, and if I
remember as I go, then, then, I will be saved. But if I get to that
skyline and if I find that the mist stops me from seeing beyond, then I
pray you kill me, for the agony of this thing is not to be borne."
Suddenly he ceased, and then, as if to some unseen person, he cried out--

"I have left my memory on that road."

Adams, frightened at the man's agitation, tried to soothe him, but
Berselius, in the grip of this awful desire to pierce back beyond that
mist and find himself, would not be soothed. Nothing would satisfy him but
to strike camp and return along the road they had come by. Some instinct
told him that the sight of the things he had seen would wake up memory,
and that bit by bit, as he went, the mist would retreat before him, and
perhaps vanish at last. Some instinct told him this, but reason, who is
ever a doubter, tortured him with doubts.

The only course was to go back and see. Adams, who doubted if his patient
was physically fit for a march, at last gave in; the man's agony of mind
was more dangerous to him than the exhaustion of physical exercise could
prove. He gave orders to the porters to strike camp, and then turned to
himself, and helped them. They only carried what was barely needful, and
was even less than needful, to take them to Fort M'Bassa, ten days,
journey in Berselius's con