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1"It was from her, too, that I learnt that fear had not yet left the world. She was fearless enough in the daylight, and
2she had the oddest confidence in me; for once, in a foolish moment, I made threatening grimaces at her, and she simply
3laughed at them. But she dreaded the dark, dreaded shadows, dreaded black things. Darkness to her was the one thing
4dreadful. It was a singularly passionate emotion, and it set me thinking and observing. I discovered then, among other
5things, that these little people gathered into the great houses after dark, and slept in droves. To enter upon them
6without a light was to put them into a tumult of apprehension. I never found one out of doors, or one sleeping alone
7within doors, after dark. Yet I was still such a blockhead that I missed the lesson of that fear, and in spite of
8Weena's distress, I insisted upon sleeping away from these slumbering multitudes. "It troubled her greatly, but in the
9end her odd affection for me triumphed, and for five of the nights of our acquaintance, including the last night of all,
10she slept with her head pillowed on my arm. But my story slips away from me as I speak of her. It must have been the
11night before her rescue that I was awakened about dawn. I had been restless, dreaming most disagreeably that I was
12drowned, and that sea anemones were feeling over my face with their soft palps. I woke with a start, and with an odd
13fancy that some greyish animal had just rushed out of the chamber. I tried to get to sleep again, but I felt restless
14and uncomfortable. It was that dim grey hour when things are just creeping out of darkness, when everything is
15colourless and clear cut, and yet unreal. I got up, and went down into the great hall, and so out upon the flagstones in
16front of the palace. I thought I would make a virtue of necessity, and see the sunrise. "The moon was setting, and the
17dying moonlight and the first pallor of dawn were mingled in a ghastly half-light. The bushes were inky black, the
18ground a sombre grey, the sky colourless and cheerless. And up the hill I thought I could see ghosts. Three several
19times, as I scanned the slope, I saw white figures. Twice I fancied I saw a solitary white, ape-like creature running
20rather quickly up the hill, and once near the ruins I saw a leash of them carrying some dark body. They moved hastily. I
21did not see what became of them. It seemed that they vanished among the bushes. The dawn was still indistinct, you must
22understand. I was feeling that chill, uncertain, early-morning feeling you may have known. I doubted my eyes. "As the
23eastern sky grew brighter, and the light of the day came on and its vivid colouring returned upon the world once more, I
24scanned the view keenly. But I saw no vestige of my white figures. They were mere creatures of the half-light. 'They
25must have been ghosts,' I said; 'I wonder whence they dated.' For a queer notion of Grant Allen's came into my head, and
26amused me. If each generation die and leave ghosts, he argued, the world at last will get overcrowded with them. On that
27theory they would have grown innumerable some Eight Hundred Thousand Years hence, and it was no great wonder to see four
28at once. But the jest was unsatisfying, and I was thinking of these figures all the morning, until Weena's rescue drove
29them out of my head. I associated them in some indefinite way with the white animal I had startled in my first
30passionate search for the Time Machine. But Weena was a pleasant substitute. Yet all the same, they were soon destined
31to take far deadlier possession of my mind. "I think I have said how much hotter than our own was the weather of this
32Golden Age. I cannot account for it. It may be that the sun was hotter, or the earth nearer the sun. It is usual to
33assume that the sun will go on cooling steadily in the future. But people, unfamiliar with such speculations as those of
34the younger Darwin, forget that the planets must ultimately fall back one by one into the parent body. As these
35catastrophes occur, the sun will blaze with renewed energy; and it may be that some inner planet had suffered this fate.
36Whatever the reason, the fact remains that the sun was very much hotter than we know it. "Well, one very hot morning--my
37fourth, I think--as I was seeking shelter from the heat and glare in a colossal ruin near the great house where I slept
38and fed, there happened this strange thing. Clambering among these heaps of masonry, I found a narrow gallery, whose end
39and side windows were blocked by fallen masses of stone. By contrast with the brilliancy outside, it seemed at first
40impenetrably dark to me. I entered it groping, for the change from light to blackness made spots of colour swim before
41me. Suddenly I halted spellbound. A pair of eyes, luminous by reflection against the daylight without, was watching me
42out of the darkness. "The old instinctive dread of wild beasts came upon me. I clenched my hands and steadfastly looked
43into the glaring eyeballs. I was afraid to turn. Then the thought of the absolute security in which humanity appeared to
44be living came to my mind. And then I remembered that strange terror of the dark. Overcoming my fear to some extent, I
45advanced a step and spoke. I will admit that my voice was harsh and ill-controlled. I put out my hand and touched
46something soft. At once the eyes darted sideways, and something white ran past me. I turned with my heart in my mouth,
47and saw a queer little ape-like figure, its head held down in a peculiar manner, running across the sunlit space behind
48me. It blundered against a block of granite, staggered aside, and in a moment was hidden in a black shadow beneath
49another pile of ruined masonry. "My impression of it is, of course, imperfect; but I know it was a dull white, and had
50strange large greyish-red eyes; also that there was flaxen hair on its head and down its back. But, as I say, it went
51too fast for me to see distinctly. I cannot even say whether it ran on all fours, or only with its forearms held very
52low. After an instant's pause I followed it into the second heap of ruins. I could not find it at first; but, after a
53time in the profound obscurity, I came upon one of those round well-like openings of which I have told you, half closed
54by a fallen pillar. A sudden thought came to me. Could this Thing have vanished down the shaft? I lit a match, and,
55looking down, I saw a small, white, moving creature, with large bright eyes which regarded me steadfastly as it
56retreated. It made me shudder. It was so like a human spider! It was clambering down the wall, and now I saw for the
57first time a number of metal foot and hand rests forming a kind of ladder down the shaft. Then the light burned my
58fingers and fell out of my hand, going out as it dropped, and when I had lit another the little monster had disappeared.
59"I do not know how long I sat peering down that well. It was not for some time that I could succeed in persuading myself
60that the thing I had seen was human. But, gradually, the truth dawned on me: that Man had not remained one species, but
61had differentiated into two distinct animals: that my graceful children of the Upper World were not the sole descendants
62of our generation, but that this bleached, obscene, nocturnal Thing, which had flashed before me, was also heir to all
63the ages. "I thought of the flickering pillars and of my theory of an underground ventilation. I began to suspect their
64true import. And what, I wondered, was this Lemur doing in my scheme of a perfectly balanced organisation? How was it
65related to the indolent serenity of the beautiful Overworlders? And what was hidden down there, at the foot of that
66shaft? I sat upon the edge of the well telling myself that, at any rate, there was nothing to fear, and that there I
67must descend for the solution of my difficulties. And withal I was absolutely afraid to go! As I hesitated, two of the
68beautiful upperworld people came running in their amorous sport across the daylight in the shadow. The male pursued the
69female, flinging flowers at her as he ran.
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