"'Well?' I said. She stood in front of me, holding my arms and impeding my advance.
"'Well!' she repeated, slowly. 'You do not know what has happened,' and again she regarded me in the way I have described.
"'No,' I said, returning her scrutiny, 'I don't understand what you mean by what has happened. I have seen a shocking thing down there. They are fighting in the _Via Egnatia_. Some are dead. We can't go that way, I'm afraid.'
"Suddenly she dropped her hands from my arms and breathed deeply. 'Come!' she said, and hurried away from me. I had spoken the truth. I did not understand her, but her demeanour alarmed me. I followed, watching the silhouette of her body sway as she took her long strides. I had a fugitive notion that this performance was symbolical of our emotional existence--our souls pursue one another through a steep darkness, the victims of unpremeditated suspicions and fears. As she reached the lighted doorway she swung round and spread out her hands with a gesture of pity and grief. 'Look!' she said. 'As we came out someone fired. She was in front. It was not my fault.... You see.'
"While she spoke I endeavoured to collect my forces. I looked down. I had a vivid impression of emerging from a place of imprisonment, a place of great noise and activity and warm, pleasant excitement, and of seeing before me a cold gray plain extending into the distance. And over this plain, I reflected, I was to travel, alone. I looked down, I say. I heard the girl beside me murmur hoarsely into my ear, and stoop to lift the form that lay motionless at our feet.
"'No!' I said, drawing her back. 'This is for me to do. I will carry my own dead.'"