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For a moment we were silent, taking stock of each other. I
dare say he found me a strange enough figure, naked, save
for my water-soaked trousers and socks, scalded, and my face
and shoulders blackened by the smoke. His face was a fair
weakness, his chin retreated, and his hair lay in crisp, almost
flaxen curls on his low forehead; his eyes were rather large,
pale blue, and blankly staring. He spoke abruptly, looking
vacantly away from me.
"What does it mean?" he said. "What do these things
mean?"
I stared at him and made no answer.
He extended a thin white hand and spoke in almost a
complaining tone.
"Why are these things permitted? What sins have we
done? The morning service was over, I was walking through
the roads to clear my brain for the afternoon, and then--fire,
earthquake, death! As if it were Sodom and Gomorrah! All
our work undone, all the work---- What are these Martians?"
"What are we?" I answered, clearing my throat.
He gripped his knees and turned to look at me again. For
half a minute, perhaps, he stared silently.
"I was walking through the roads to clear my brain," he
said. "And suddenly--fire, earthquake, death!"
He relapsed into silence, with his chin now sunken almost
to his knees.
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