Had he been afraid, or had his blood merely been chilled by the somber coldness of a stormy evening? I wonder what thoughts were coursing through his mind just then. They must have been strange fancies. I could nearly believe I saw them, pressing hard upon him, rending him with thin wild fingers, catching at his very breath. He seemed to be struggling against them almost with physical violence, alone in the world which his life had fashioned. What was it, I wonder, that brought the blood back to his cheeks again and set the light dancing in his eye?
It was not any outside force, for the room was dark and chill. It was some flame within him, leaping up from the dead embers of the years, pouring life into dead tissues. It was warming him, imbuing him with resolution, like some rare and cost
