They parted rather coldly. Maskull stood erect where they had stopped, and watched Panawe out of sight. He sighed more than once.
He became aware that something was about to happen. The air was breathless. The late - afternoon sunshine, unobstructed, wrapped his frame in voluptuous heat. A solitary cloud, immensely high, raced through the sky overhead.
A single trumpet note sounded in the far distance from somewhere behind him. It gave him an impression of being several miles away at first; but then it slowly swelled, and came nearer and nearer at the same time that it increased in volume. Still the same note sounded, but now it was as if blown by a giant trumpeter immediately over his head. Then it gradually diminished in force, and travelled away in front of him. It ended very faintly and distantly.
He felt himself alone with Nature. A sacred stillness came over his heart. Past and future were forgotten. The forest, the sun, the day did not exist for him. He was unconscious of himself - he had no thoughts and no feelings. Yet never had Life had such an altitude for him.
A man stood, with crossed arms, right in his path. He was so clothed that his limbs were exposed, while his body was covered. He was young rather than old. Maskull observed that his countenance possessed none of the special organs of Tormance, to which he had not even yet become reconciled. He was smooth - faced. His whole person seemed to radiate an excess of life, like the trembling of air on a hot day. His eyes had such force that Maskull could not meet them.
He addressed Maskull by name, in an extraordinary voice. It had a double tone. The primary one sounded far away; the second was an undertone, like a sympathetic tanging string.