THE TIME MACHINE

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the night before her rescue that I was awakened about dawn. I had
been restless, dreaming most disagreeably that I was drowned, and
that sea anemones were feeling over my face with their soft palps.
I woke with a start, and with an odd fancy that some greyish animal
had just rushed out of the chamber. I tried to get to sleep again,
but I felt restless and uncomfortable. It was that dim grey hour
when things are just creeping out of darkness, when everything is
colourless and clear cut, and yet unreal. I got up, and went down
into the great hall, and so out upon the flagstones in front of the
palace. I thought I would make a virtue of necessity, and see the
sunrise.

'The moon was setting, and the dying moonlight and the first pallor
of dawn were mingled in a ghastly half-light. The bushes were inky
black, the ground a sombre grey, the sky colourless and cheerless.
And up the hill I thought I could see ghosts. There several times,
as I scanned the slope, I saw white figures. Twice I fancied I saw