The People of the Mist

"Yes, Outram, it was lucky for me that your arm is strong and your mind quick. Ah, I am a dreadful coward, and I can see the place now;" and he shuddered. "Always from a child I have believed that I shall die by a fall from some height, and to-night I thought that my hour had come. At first I did not understand, for I was watching the Senora's face in the moonlight, and to me she looked like an angel. Then I saw, and my senses left me. It was as though hands were stretched up from the blackness to drag me down—yes, I saw the hands. But you saved me, Outram, though that will not help me, for I shall perish in some such way at last. So be it. It is best that I should die, who cannot conquer the evil of my heart." "Nonsense, my friend," said Leonard; "don't talk like that about dying. We can none of us afford to die just at present—that is, unless we are obliged to do so. Your nerves are upset, and no wonder! As for 'the evil of your heart,' I wish that most men had as little—the world would be better. Come, go to sleep; you will feel very differently to-morrow."