But, before he had time to realise the full enjoyment of these new sensations, a stinging, blinding pain shot suddenly through his right shoulder as if a red-hot iron had pierced to the very bone. He screamed out in agony; though, even while he screamed, the pain passed. Then the same thing happened in his other shoulder. It shot through his back with equal swiftness, and was gone, leaving him lying on the bed trembling with pain. But the instant it was gone the delightful sensations of strength and lightness returned, and he felt as if his whole body were charged with some new and potent force. The pains had come at last! Jimbo had no notion how they could possibly be connected with escape, but Miss Lake--his kind and faithful friend, Miss Lake--had said that no escape was possible without them; and had promised that they should be brief. And this was true, for the entire episode had not taken a minute of time. "ESCAPE, ESCAPE!"--the words rushed through him like a flame of fire. Out of this dreadful Empty House, into the open spaces; beyond the prison wall; out where the wind and the rain could touch him; where he could feel the grass beneath his feet, and could see the whole sky at once, instead of this narrow strip through the window. His thoughts flew to the stars and the clouds.... But a strange humming of voices interrupted his flight of imagination, and he saw that the room was suddenly full of moving figures. They were passing before him with silent footsteps, across the window from door to door. How they had come in, or how they went out, he never knew; but his heart stood still for an instant as he recognised the mournful figures of the Frightened Children filing before him in a slow procession. They were singing--though it sounded more like a chorus of whispering than actual singing--and as they moved past with the measured steps of their sorrowful dance, he caught the words of the song he had heard them sing when he first came into the house:-- "We hear the little voices in the wind Singing of freedom we may never find." Jimbo put his fingers into his ears, but still the sound came through. He heard the words almost as if they were inside himself--his own thoughts singing:-- "We hear the little footsteps in the rain Running to help us, though they run in vain, Tapping in hundreds on the window-pane." The horrible procession filed past and melted away near the door. They were gone as mysteriously as they had come, and almost before he realised it.