r, as if
something was calling him--calling without sound. It returned to him--
the thought of That which had waited through all the ages to see what
he--one man--would do. He had never exactly pitied himself before--he
did not know that he pitied himself now, but he was a man going to his
death, and a light, cold sweat broke out on him and it seemed as if it
was not he who did it, but some other--he flung out his arms and cried
aloud words he had not known he was going to speak.

"Lord! Lord! What shall I do to be saved?"

But the Silence gave no answer. It was the Silence still.

And after standing a few moments panting, his arms fell and his head
dropped, and turning the handle of the door, he went out to buy the
pistol.

II

As he went down the narrow staircase, covered with its dingy and
threadbare carpet, he found the house so full of dirty yellow haze that
he realized that the fog must be of the extraordinary ones which are
remembered in after-years as abnormal specimens of their kind. He
recalled that there had been one of the sort three years before, and
that traffic and business had been almost entirely stopped by it, that
accidents had happened in the streets, and that people having lost their
way had wandered about turning corners until they found themselves far
from their intended destinations and obliged to take refuge in hotels or
the houses of hospitable strangers. Curious incidents had occurred and
odd stories were told by those who had felt themselves obliged by
circumstances to go out into the baffling gloom. He guessed that
something of a like nature had fallen upon the town again. The
gas-light on the landings and in the melancholy hall burned feebly--so
feebly that one got but a vague view of the rickety hat-stand and the
shabby overcoats and head-gear hanging upon it. It was well for him
that he had but a corner or so to turn before he reached the pawnshop in
whose window he had seen the pistol he intended to buy.

When he opened the street-door he saw that the fog was, upon the whole,
perhaps even heavier and more obscuring, if possible, than the one so
well remembered. He could not see anything three feet before him, he
could not see with distinctness anything two feet ahead. The sensation
of stepping forward was uncertain and mysterious enough to be almost
appalling. A man not sufficiently cautious might have fallen into any
open hole in his path. Antony Dart kept as closely a