..
And what else could Christine say but no? Would she not prefer
to espouse death itself rather than that living corpse? She did
not know that on her acceptance or refusal depended the awful fate
of many members of the human race!
Eleven o'clock to-morrow evening!
And we dragged ourselves through the darkness, feeling our way
to the stone steps, for the light in the trap-door overhead that
led to the room of mirrors was now extinguished; and we repeated
to ourselves:
"Eleven o'clock to-morrow evening!"
At last, I found the staircase. But, suddenly I drew myself up
on the first step, for a terrible thought had come to my mind:
"What is the time?"
Ah, what was the time?...For, after all, eleven o'clock to-morrow
evening might be now, might be this very moment! Who could tell us
the time? We seemed to have been imprisoned in that hell for days
and days...for years...since the beginning of the world.
Perhaps we should be blown up then and there! Ah, a sound! A crack!
"Did you hear that?...There, in the corner...good heavens!...
Like a sound of machinery!...Again!...Oh, for a light!...
Perhaps it's the machinery that is to blow everything up!.
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