The motives of their secret souls rose to the eyes, and
mouths, and foreheads, and hung there for all to see like the black
banners of an assembly of ill-starred and fallen creatures. Demons--was
the horrible word that flashed through his brain like a sheet of fire.
When this sudden discovery leaped out upon him, for a moment he lost his
self-control. Without waiting to think and weigh his extraordinary
impression, he did a very foolish but a very natural thing. Feeling
himself irresistibly driven by the sudden stress to some kind of action,
he sprang to his feet--and screamed! To his own utter amazement he stood
up and shrieked aloud!
But no one stirred. No one, apparently, took the slightest notice of his
absurdly wild behaviour. It was almost as if no one but himself had
heard the scream at all--as though the music had drowned it and
swallowed it up--as though after all perhaps he had not really screamed
as loudly as he imagined, or had not screamed at all.
Then, as he glanced at the motionless, dark faces before him, something
of utter cold passed into his being, touching his very soul.
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