From somewhere in the black depths before them came a laugh, made unhuman by echoes.

And Byrne had visioned the mummied dead pushing back the granite lids of their sarcophagi and sitting upright.
But that was nothing compared with this.

Not half so wild or strange.
He listened again, breathless, with the sharp prickling running up and down his spine.

It was the honking of the wild geese, flying north.

And out of the sound he builded a picture of the grey triangle cleaving through the cold upper sky, sent on a mission no man could understand.
"Was I right?
Was I right ?" shrilled the invalid, and when Byrne turned towards him, he saw the old man sitting erect, with an expression of wild triumph.