I glanced over my shoulder and saw his attendant with him.
I ran furiously up the slope, over it, then turning eastward along
a rocky valley fringed on either side with jungle I ran for perhaps
a mile altogether, my chest straining, my heart beating in my ears;
and then hearing nothing of Montgomery or his man, and feeling
upon the verge of exhaustion, I doubled sharply back towards
the beach as I judged, and lay down in the shelter of a canebrake.
There I remained for a long time, too fearful to move, and indeed
too fearful even to plan a course of action. The wild scene about me
lay sleeping silently under the sun, and the only sound near me was
the thin hum of some small gnats that had discovered me. Presently I
became aware of a drowsy breathing sound, the soughing of the sea upon
the beach.

After about an hour I heard Montgomery shouting my name,
far away to the north. That set me thinking of my plan of action.
As I interpreted it then, this island was inhabited only by these two
vivisectors and their animalised victims. Some of these no doubt
they could press into their service against me if need arose.
I knew both Moreau and Montgomery carried revolvers; and, save for a feeble
bar of deal spiked with a small nail, the merest mockery of a mace,
I was unarmed.

So I lay still there, until I began to think of food and drink;
and at that thought the real hopelessness of my position came home to me.
I knew no way of getting anything to eat. I was too ignorant of botany
to discover any resort of root or fruit that might lie about me;
I had no means of trapping the few rabbits upon the island.
It grew blanker the more I turned the prospect over. At last in
the desperation of my position, my mind turned to the animal men I