emember now the look of his faded
eyes and the lids red stained--perhaps you know that look.

"I'm not just arguing about a matter of opinion," he said.
"The thing's killing me."

"Dreams?"

"If you call them dreams. Night after night. Vivid!--so
vivid . . . . this--" (he indicated the landscape that went
streaming by the window) "seems unreal in comparison! I can
scarcely remember who I am, what business I am on . . . ."

He paused. "Even now--"

"The dream is always the same--do you mean?" I asked.

"It's over."

"You mean?"

"I died."

"Died?"

"Smashed and killed, and now, so much of me as that dream was,
is dead. Dead forever. I dreamt I was another man, you know,
living in a different part of the world and in a different time.
I dreamt that night after night. Night after night I woke into
that other life. Fresh scenes and fresh happenings--until I came
upon the last--"

"When you died?"

"When I died."

"And since then--"

"No," he said. "Thank God! That was the end of the dream . . ."

It was clear I was in for this dream. And after all, I had an
hour before me, the light was fading fast, and Fortnum Roscoe has
a dreary way with him. "Living in a different time," I said: "do
you mean in some different age?"

"Yes."

"Past?"

"No, to come--to come."

"The year three thousand, for example?"

"I don't know what year it was. I did when I was asleep, when
I was dreaming, that is, but not now--not now that I am awake.
There's a lot of things I have forgotten since I woke out of these
dreams, though I knew them at the time when I was--I suppose it was
dreaming. They called the year differently from our way of calling
the year . . . What did they call it?" He put his hand to his
forehead. "No," said he, "I forget."

He sat smiling weakly. For a moment I feared he did not mean
to tell me his dream. As a rule I hate people who tell their
dreams, but this struck me differently. I proffered assistance
even. "It began--" I suggested.

"It was vivid from the first. I seemed to wake up in it
suddenly. And it's curious that in these dreams I am speaking of
I never remembered this life I am living now. It seemed as if the
dream life was enough while it lasted. Perhaps--But I will tell
you how I find myself when I do my best to recall it all. I don't
remember anything clearly until I found myself sitting in a sort of
loggia looking out over the sea. I had been dozing, an