His voice died away in a choking sob, and I imagine he swooned away.  As we were being towed by the legs, I guessed that Holman was suffering excruciating pain from the limb that he had injured by the fall from the maupei tree, and the lapse into unconsciousness came as a blessed relief.  To me the rush through the jungle seemed a superlative nightmare.  My mind played tricks with me.  I thought that the three black forms, leaping along in front, were a trinity of devils who were ordered to torture me for my stupidity in allowing Edith Herndon and her sister to leave the yacht.  Every creeper became a whip wielded by a mocking phantom, and I am forced to confess that I have a vivid recollection of crying to heaven for pardon for my criminal negligence.  Every horror that the happenings of the previous forty-eight hours had germinated within my brain sprang into lusty being as my mind trembled upon the abyss of insanity, and Edith Herndon was the person that the legion of horrors threatened.

I came to my proper senses to find that our towing trinity had called a halt.  Holman was repeating a question over and over again, and I endeavoured to moisten my dry throat so that I could answer.

“Where are we?” he groaned.  “Where are we?  Are you dead, Verslun?  Open your eyes and take a look around; my peepers are bunged up.”

I managed to open my eyes, but I could see nothing but the encompassing jungle.  For a few minutes I thought that we were alone.  Then I made out the three figures crouched in front of us upon the grass.  Their heads were turned away from us, and they were facing the east, where the faint luminous glow of the rising moon was just beginning to appear in the sky.

The three were motionless.  They were squatting upon their hams, and their attitude seemed uncanny when I compared it with the mad film of action which my mental machinery had recorded during the preceding hours.  They had stopped for some purpose, but that purpose I could not determine.

“Are they there?” asked Holman.

“Yes,” I murmured.

“What are they doing?”

“Sitting in a line staring at the hills.”

The youngster gave a grunt, turned his head till he managed to wipe the mud and blood from his eyes upon my shoulder, then he peered at the silent three.  Their motionless forms fascinated him.  It was hard to connect them with the three bounding devils who had brought us on a gallop that was more painful than the bareback ride which the Polish nobleman gave to the intriguing Mazeppa.

“What do you make of it?” he whispered.

“They’re resting perhaps.”

“Not them!  They look as if they’re hatching some new villainy.”

Minute after minute crept by, but the three remained inactive.  They took no notice of our whispered conversation.  No Hindu Yogis ever sat meditating with the absolute immovability of the three, and as our wounds stiffened under the cold night air, we became foolishly angry at the wait.  If we had to meet death, it would please us to get it over as soon as possible.