Controlling the sickness within him, he went around the cell several times, eyes shut, groping carefully; and at last, like a blessing, there came to his finger-tips the feel of the joining of the door-edge; and the world, swinging, readjusted itself; and again, in his head, like a reassurance, he held the plan of the prison. Preserving this carefully, he dropped to his hands and knees and crawled over the floor. It stretched, smooth, without a wrinkle, between the four smooth walls; there was on it nothing, not a stool, not a blanket—nothing.
He stood up in the centre. There oozed to him not a drop of light; above his head, cold eddies of air passed like vague beings. A desire was growing within him—a desire to beat upon the floor and walls, to hammer and to shout.
To resist it, he sat upon the floor; it was cold and very hard. He tried to lie down and relax himself to patience. He began to wonder how long he had been here. He did not know if it was an hour or a minute.
He tried talking to himself. A timidity, a dif-
