.

With his eyes wide open Valentine gazed in the direction of Julian,
sitting invisible opposite to him. He wondered how Julian was feeling,
what he was thinking. And then he remembered that strange saying of
Marr's, that thoughts could take form, materialize. What would he give
to witness that monstrous procession of embodied brain-actions trooping
from the mind of his friend! He imagined them small, spare, phantom-like
things, fringed with fire, as weapon against the darkness, silent-footed
as spirits, moving with a level impetus, as pale ghosts treading a sea,
onward to the vast world of clashing minds, to which we carelessly
cast out our thoughts as a man who shoots rubbish into a cart. The
vagrant fancies danced along with attenuated steps and tiny, whimsical
gestures of fairies, fluttering their flame-veined wings. The sad
thoughts moved slowly with drooped heads and monotonous hands, and
tears fell forever about their feet. The thoughts that were evil--and
Julian had acknowledged them many, though combatted--were endowed with
a strangely sinister gait, like the gait of those modern sinners who
express, ignorantly, in their motions the hidden deeds their tongues
decline to speak. The wayward thoughts had faces like women, who kiss
and frown within the limits of an hour. On the cheeks of the libertine
thoughts a rosy cloud of rouge shone softly, and their haggard eyes
were brightened by a cunning pigment. And the noble thoughts, grand
in gesture, godlike in bearing, did not pass them by, but spoke to them
serene words, and sought to bring them out from their degradation. And
there was no music in this imagined procession which Valentine longed
to see. All was silent as from the gulf of Julian's mind the inhabitants
stole furtively to do their mission. Yes, Valentine knew to-night that
he should feel no wonder if thought took form, if a disembodied voice
spoke, or a detached hand moved into ripples of the air. Only he was
irritated and alarmed by the abiding sense of some surrounding danger,
which stayed with him, which he fought against in vain. His common sense
had not deserted him. On the contrary, it was argumentative, cogent in
explanation and in rebuke. It strove to sneer his distress down with
stinging epithets, and shot arrows of laughter against his aimless
fears. But the combat was, nevertheless, tamely unequal. Common sense
was routed by this enigmatic enemy, and at length Valentine's spirits
became so v