When Toyner realised what the full effect of the moonlight was going to be, he dropped his oars and sat still for a few minutes, wondering if he would be able to find the landmarks that were necessary, so strange did the landscape look, so wonderful and gigantic were the shapes which the dead trees assumed.  Then he continued his path, looking for a tree that was black and blasted by lightning.  He was obliged to grope his way close to the trees; thus his boat bumped once or twice on hidden stumps.  It occurred to him to think what a very lonely place it would be to die in, and a premonition that he was going to die came across him.

Having found the blasted tree, he counted four fallen trees; they came at intervals in the outer row of standing ones; then there was a break in the forest, and he turned his boat into it and paused to listen.

The sound that met his ear—­almost the strangest sound that could have been heard in that place—­was that of human speech; it was still some distance away, but he heard a voice raised in angry excitement, supplicating, threatening, defying, and complaining.

Toyner began to row down the untried water-way which was opened to his boat.  The idea that any one had found Markham in such a place and at such an hour was too extraordinary to be credited.  Toyner looked eagerly into the mist.  He could see nothing but queer-shaped gulfs of light between trunks and branches.  Again his boat rubbed unexpectedly against a stump, and again the strange premonition of approaching death came over him.  For a moment he thought that his wisest course would be to return.  Then he decided to go forward; but before obeying this command, his mind gave one of those sudden self-attentive flashes the capacity for which marks off the mind of the reflective type from others.  He saw himself as he sat there, his whole appearance and dress; he took in his history, and the place to which that hour had brought him, he, Bart Toyner, a thin, somewhat drooping, middle-aged man, unsuccessful, because of his self-indulgence, in all that he had attempted, yet having carried about with him always high desires, which had never had the slightest realisation except in the one clear shining space of vision and victory which had been his for a few months and now was gone.  The light had mocked him; now perhaps he was going to die!

He pushed his boat on, his sensations melting into an excited blank of thought in which curiosity was alone apparent.  He was growing strangely excited after his long calm despondency; no doubt the excitement of the other, who was shouting and jabbering not far away in the moonlit night, affected him.

He found his way through the trees of the opening; evidently the splash of his oar was caught by the owner of the noisy voice, for before he could see any one a silence succeeded to the noise, a sudden absolute silence, in itself shocking.

“Are you there, Markham?” cried Toyner.