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 did or what I spoke. The place was all deserted, the woods were brown, the music was silent, the flowers were dead.

I awoke stupidly, as it were, but yet I was quite calm, and I knew what had chanced to me. It seemed to me that I had lived many years since that horrible night. My hair was gray. I felt feeble and grown old.

Life was ended for me, you know. I wondered why I was not dead as others were, and quiet in my grave.

When they let me go I walked out into the forsaken streets: they looked so strange—there was scarcely a soul in them, and the shutters of the houses were closed. I had only one idea—to follow them, to find them. And I had lost so much time: it was now nearly winter.

My chief and his troop had all gone, of course. What little money I had hadhad [sic] people had taken whilst I was unconscious. They told me I owed my life to charity. My life! I laughed aloud in their faces.

They were afraid of me: they thought I was mad still. But I was not. I knew what I did, and I had one fixed purpose left, which was quite clear to me, and for which alone I endured to live an hour.