Page:Taylor - In the Dwellings of the Wilderness.djvu/164

 strained and tired. "Three times I had that dream. I used to wait for it, and long for it, to intoxicate myself with her loveliness, but even in my sleep I was conscious of trying desperately to waken before the—the change should come. I never succeeded, and when I did wake, it was always in the same shiver of mortal fear, with that thing, dark and stiff, on the ground at my feet. And the third time …"

Again he stopped, controlling himself with an effort, gathering fresh strength to continue.

"Have you ever roused suddenly from sleep at night, for no apparent cause, and realised that your mind, your consciousness, was broadly awake while for a bare instant your body still slept, as it were?