Then it seemed to him that he was swooning. He struggled against the feeling; and for what seemed to him an interminable time he wavered between consciousness and insensibility. It was either growing darker or he was losing the power to see. He could not distinguish clearly any longer that human hand, smeared with blood, sticking ludicrously in the air from amid a pile of bags, coats, and all sorts of things thrown together just where the position of his head constrained him to look. He had been seeing that hand for a long time, it seemed to him, and only now that the darkness had so increased as to cut it off from his sight did he realize what it was and what it must mean. He still retained a consciousness of the face of Berenice, warm against his bosom, and with each wave of faintness he struggled to keep his senses that he might protect her. The din of noises seemed far away, the cries somewhere at a distance ever increasing. The moans that had seemed to him those of the girl who clutched his arm grew fainter, until they were lost in the buzz and whirr of a hundred other sounds. Then the clasp which held him relaxed as suddenly as if a rope had been cut away. It came into his mind with a wave of horror that the girl who had held him was dead. The thought that Berenice might be dead also followed like a flash, and aroused his benumbed senses. He spoke to her; he tried to move; to release her from her position. He seemed buried under a mound of debris, and she gave no sign of life. He exhausted himself in frantic attempts to escape; to get his arms free; to turn his head far enough to see her face; to thrust back the rubbish which had fallen against them. The anguish to his arm was so great that he could not continue; he could do nothing but suffer whatever fate had in store for him. He tried to pray; but his prayers were broken and confused ejaculations.