The whistler had stopped before I reached the crest of the hill, and after
trying vainly to locate his whereabouts in the gloom, I leaned up against
one of the outermost trunks of the perky little clump of trees, and facing
East awaited developments. A thin, cold wind had sprung up, and was
quietly stirring the leaves above me to an uneasy sibilance. I heard, now,
too, an occasional sleepy twitter as if a few members of the orchestra had
come into their places and were indolently testing the tune of their
pipes. It came into my mind that the cold stir of air was the spirit of
the dying night, fleeing westward before the sun. Also, I found myself
wondering what would be the effect on us all if one morning we waited in
vain for the sunrise? I tried to picture my own emotions as the truth was
slowly borne in upon me that some unprecedented calamity had silently and
without any premonition befallen the whole world of men. Would one crouch
in a terror of apprehension? I could not see it that way. I believed that
I should be trembling with a furious excitement, stirred to the very
depths by so inspiring and adventurous a miracle. I had forsaken my
speculation and was indulging in the philosophical reflection that a real
and quite unaccountable miracle, the more universal the better, would be
the most splendid justification of life I could possibly conceive, when
the whistler began again, only a few yards away from me.

I could just see him now, sitting propped against the trunk of another
tree, but I waited until he had finished what I chose to believe was the
third verse of his lyric before I hailed him. It came to me that I might
test his quality by continuing the play in proper form, so when he paused,
I went on with the speech of the "host" which immediately follows the song
in "The Two Gentlemen of Verona."

"How now?" I said. "Are you sadder than you were before?"

He did not move, not even to turn his head towards me, and I inferred that
he was aware of my presence before I spoke.

"You, one of the search party?" he asked.

I went over and sat down by him. I felt that the situation was
sufficiently fantastic to permit of free speech. I did not know who he was
and I did not care. I only knew that I wanted to deliver myself of the
dreams my lack of sleep had robbed from me.

"The only one," I said, "unless you also belong to the very small and
select party of searchers."

I fancy that he turned his head a little