mine was high above him, so steeped in the glow of an angry sunset,
that I had shaded my eyes with my hand before I saw him at all.

"Halloa! Below!"

From looking down the Line, he turned himself about again, and,
raising his eyes, saw my figure high above him.

"Is there any path by which I can come down and speak to you?"

He looked up at me without replying, and I looked down at him
without pressing him too soon with a repetition of my idle question.
Just then there came a vague vibration in the earth and air, quickly
changing into a violent pulsation, and an oncoming rush that caused
me to start back, as though it had force to draw me down. When such
vapour as rose to my height from this rapid train had passed me, and
was skimming away over the landscape, I looked down again, and saw
him refurling the flag he had shown while the train went by.

I repeated my inquiry. After a pause, during which he seemed to
regard me with fixed attention, he motioned with his rolled-up flag
towards a point on my level, some two or three hundred yards
distant. I called down to him, "All right!" and made for that
point. There, by dint of looking closely about me, I found a rough
zigzag descending path notched out, which I followed.

The cutting was extremely deep, and unusually precipitate. It was
made through a clammy stone, that became oozier and wetter as I went
down. For these reasons, I found the way long enough to give me
time to recall a singular air of reluctance or compulsion with which