The light was fading out of his sky.
It was the last dim instinct of nature that made him reach out a groping hand, and with lips that would scarcely move to whisper, "Puck!" He did not expect an answer.

The things of earth were done with.

His life was passing swiftly, swiftly, like the sands running out of a glass.

He had lost her already, and the world had sunk away, away, with all warmth and light and love.
Yet out of the darkness all suddenly there came a voice, eager, passionate, persistent.

"I am here, Billikins! I am here! Come back to me, darling! Come back!" He started at that voice, started and paused, holding back as it were on the very verge of the precipice.