The ceaseless chime of the waves, and the regularity of the rustling play of the pebbles, seemed to lull and soothe me, almost in spite of myself.

Cold I was, and in sharp pain, but my mind had not energy enough either for fear or effort.

What appeared to me most terrible was the sensation, coming back time after time, of sinking, sinking into the fancied chasm beneath me.
I remember also watching a spray of ivy, far above my head, swaying and waving about in the wind; and a little bird, darting here and there with a brisk flutter of its tiny wings, and a chirping note of satisfaction; and the cloud drifting in soft, small cloudlets across the sky.

These things I saw, not as if they were real, but rather as if they were memories of things that had passed before my eyes many years before.
At last--- whether years or hours only had gone by, I could not then have told you--I heard the regular and careful beat of oars upon the water, and presently the grating of a boat's keel upon the shingle, with the rattle of a chain cast out with the grapnel.

I could not turn round or raise my head, but I was sure it was Tardif, and that he did not yet see me, for he was whistling softly to himself.