neck.

CHAPTER XXIV

NIGHTMARE

I had not closed my eyes the night before on the Twentieth Century, and
what of that and of my exhaustion I slept soundly. When I first awoke,
it was night. Garthwaite had not returned. I had lost my watch and had
no idea of the time. As I lay with my eyes closed, I heard the same
dull sound of distant explosions. The inferno was still raging. I crept
through the store to the front. The reflection from the sky of vast
conflagrations made the street almost as light as day. One could have
read the finest print with ease. From several blocks away came the
crackle of small hand-bombs and the churning of machine-guns, and from a
long way off came a long series of heavy explosions. I crept back to my
horse blankets and slept again.

When next I awoke, a sickly yellow light was filtering in on me. It was
dawn of the second day. I crept to the front of the store. A smoke pall,
shot through with lurid gleams, filled the sky. Down the opposite
side of the street tottered a wretched slave. One hand he held tightly
against his side, and behind him he left a bloody trail. His eyes roved
everywhere, and they were filled with apprehension and dread. Once he
looked straight across at me, and in his face was all the dumb pathos
of the wounded and hunted animal. He saw me, but there was no kinship
between us, and with him, at least, no sympathy of understanding; for
he cowered perceptibly and dragged himself on. He could expect no aid
in all God's world. He was a helot in the great hunt of helots that the
masters were making. All he could hope for, all he sought, was some hole
to crawl away in and hide like any animal. The sharp clang of a passing
ambulance at the corner gave him a start. Ambulances were not for such
as he. With a groan of pain he threw himself into a doorway. A minute
later he was out again and desperately hobbling on.

I went back to my horse blankets and waited an hour for Garthwaite. My
headache had not gone away. On the contrary, it was increasing. It was
by an effort of will only that I was able to open my eyes and look
at objects. And with the opening of my eyes and the looking came
intolerable torment. Also, a great pulse was beating in my brain. Weak
and reeling, I went out through the broken window and down the street,
seeking to escape, instinctively and gropingly, from the awful shambles.
And thereafter I lived nightmare. My memory of what happened in the
succeedin