It was
blue-gray in the first place. In the second, the eyes were rolled
back till you could only see the whites of them; and, in the third,
the face was the face of a demon--a ghoul--anything you please
except of the sleek, oily old ruffian who sat in the day-time over
his turning-lathe downstairs. He was lying on his stomach, with his
arms turned and crossed behind him, as if he had been thrown down
pinioned. His head and neck were the only parts of him off the
floor. They were nearly at right angles to the body, like the head
of a cobra at spring. It was ghastly. In the centre of the room,
on the bare earth floor, stood a big, deep, brass basin, with a pale
blue-green light floating in the centre like a night-light. Round
that basin the man on the floor wriggled himself three times. How
he did it I do not know. I could see the muscles ripple along his
spine and fall smooth again; but I could not see any other motion.
The head seemed the only thing alive about him, except that slow
curl and uncurl of the laboring back-muscles.
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