It was a very short way to the next barrier, and of the barrier very short what was to be seen. The buttress of the cliff pressed steadily out to what was no more than a little table of rock, scarcely thicker above the surface than the thickness of a table-top, then seemed to fall away. A trifle beyond the table there upstood a detached pile of rock, rather like a pulpit and standing about a pulpit's height above the water. That table--when it ran far out along the shore--was where Mr. Puddlebox, looking back, had last seen his loony stand. He remembered it, for he remembered the summit of the pulpit rock that peered above it. The idea to shout occurred to him. That low table seemed to mark a corner. His loony might be beyond it. If he shouted-- He did not dare to shout. Here, more than before, the intensity of the silence possessed him. He did not dare to break it. Here, with no beach visible, the water seemed profoundly dead in slumber. "Why don't you break and roar?" said Mr. Puddlebox. "Why don't you--" he held his breath and crept forward. He lowered himself and caught his breath. His feet crunched upon the shingle bed, the water stood above his knees, and while the stones still moved where he had disturbed them he stood perfectly still. When they had settled he began to move, sideways, very slowly, his back against the cliff. Each sidelong step took him deeper; at each he more sharply caught his breath. It seemed to him as though the cliff were actually pressing him forward with huge hands. He pressed against it with all his force as though to hold it back. It thrust him, thrust him, thrust him. He was deep to his thighs. He was deep to his waist. "Water takes your breath," Mr. Puddlebox had said. At each deepening step more violently his breath seemed to be taken, more clutchingly had to be recalled. He was above his waist. He stumbled and gave a cry and recovered himself and began to go back; tried to control his dreadful breathing; came on again; then again retreated. Now his breathing that had been sobbing gasps became sheer sobs. He suddenly turned from his sidelong progress, went backwards in two splashing strides whence he had come--in three, in four, and then in a panic headlong rush, and as if he were pursued clambered frantically out again upon the slimy rocks. As if he were pursued--and now, as if to sight the pursuit, looked sobbing back upon the water he had churned. There was scarcely a sign of his churning. Scarcely a mark of his track. Still as before the water lay there. Still, and thick, and silent, and asleep, and seemed to mock his fears.