And the thought was this:  That gulf, of course, existed, but Sanderson had somehow bridged it.

It was much later than night when she awoke out of troubled, uneasy dreams and heard a sound that twisted her very nerves with fear.  It passed immediately with full waking, for, listen as she might, there was nothing audible but the inarticulate murmur of the night.  It was in her dreams she heard it, and the dreams had vanished with it.  But the sound was recognizable, for it was that rushing noise that had come across the lawn; only this time closer.  Just above her face while she slept had passed this murmur as of rustling branches in the very room, a sound of foliage whispering.  “A going in the tops of the mulberry trees,” ran through her mind.  She had dreamed that she lay beneath a spreading tree somewhere, a tree that whispered with ten thousand soft lips of green; and the dream continued for a moment even after waking.

She sat up in bed and stared about her.  The window was open at the top; she saw the stars; the door, she remembered, was locked as usual; the room, of course, was empty.  The deep hush of the summer night lay over all, broken only by another sound that now issued from the shadows close beside the bed, a human sound, yet unnatural, a sound that seized the fear with which she had waked and instantly increased it.  And, although it was one she recognized as familiar, at first she could not name it.  Some seconds certainly passed—­and, they were very long ones—­before she understood that it was her husband talking in his sleep.

The direction of the voice confused and puzzled her, moreover, for it was not, as she first supposed, beside her.  There was distance in it.  The next minute, by the light of the sinking candle flame, she saw his white figure standing out in the middle of the room, half-way towards the window.  The candle-light slowly grew.  She saw him move then nearer to the window, with arms outstretched.  His speech was low and mumbled, the words running together too much to be distinguishable.

And she shivered.  To her, sleep-talking was uncanny to the point of horror; it was like the talking of the dead, mere parody of a living voice, unnatural.

“David!” she whispered, dreading the sound of her own voice, and half afraid to interrupt him and see his face.  She could not bear the sight of the wide-opened eyes.  “David, you’re walking in your sleep.  Do—­come back to bed, dear, please!”

Her whisper seemed so dreadfully loud in the still darkness.  At the sound of her voice he paused, then turned slowly round to face her.  His widely-opened eyes stared into her own without recognition; they looked through her into something beyond; it was as though he knew the direction of the sound, yet cold not see her.  They were shining, she noticed, as the eyes of Sanderson had shone several hours ago; and his face was flushed, distraught.  Anxiety was written upon every feature.  And, instantly, recognizing that the fever was upon him, she forgot her terror temporarily in practical considerations.  He came back to bed without waking.  She closed his eyelids.  Presently he composed himself quietly to sleep, or rather to deeper sleep.  She contrived to make him swallow something from the tumbler beside the bed.