Whoever he might be, he
was prepared for this, and gave no sign for my enlightenment.
I had the papers in my hand, when my deaf friend interposed with a
suggestion.
'It has occurred to me,' he said, 'bearing in mind your sequel to
the tale we have finished, that if such of us as have anything to
relate of our own lives could interweave it with our contribution
to the Clock, it would be well to do so. This need be no restraint
upon us, either as to time, or place, or incident, since any real
passage of this kind may be surrounded by fictitious circumstances,
and represented by fictitious characters. What if we make this an
article of agreement among ourselves?'
The proposition was cordially received, but the difficulty appeared
to be that here was a long story written before we had thought of
it.
'Unless,' said I, 'it should have happened that the writer of this
tale - which is not impossible, for men are apt to do so when they
write - has actually mingled with it something of his own endurance
and experience.'
Nobody spoke, but I thought I detected in one quarter that this was
really the case.
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