Something
dragged him ... dragged the nerves from his body dragged, dragged,
dragged.... It was an irresistible suction ... pitiless ... passionless
... immense.
Sparks, blue, crimson and violet, seemed to play around the living
battery. It reached the finest fibres of his mind.... Slowly ... every
trace of mentality disappeared.... First the will ... then feeling ...
judgment ... memory ... fear even.... All that was stored in his
brain-cells came forth to be absorbed by that mighty engine....
The Princess With the Yellow Veil appeared ... flitted across the room
and melted away. She was followed by childhood memories ... girls'
heads, boys' faces.... He saw his dead mother waving her arms to him....
An expression of death-agony distorted the placid features.... Then,
throwing a kiss to him, she, too, disappeared. Picture on picture
followed.... Words of love that he had spoken ... sins, virtues,
magnanimities, meannesses, terrors ... mathematical formulas even, and
snatches of songs. Leontina came and was swallowed up.
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