CHAPTER XLVI
He stood still and strained his ears in terror, fearing to hear the sound of the car crashing off the road somewhere at a corner. Was not that the sound of a motor in the distance? Was that terrible and deathly silence the end? Beside himself. Prokop dashed down the road after her. Running down the serpentine road, he finally reached the end of the slope. But not a trace of the car was to be seen. He rushed back again, examining the road on each side, clambered down, tearing his hands whenever he caught sight of anything conspicuous, but it always proved to be only a stone or a bush, and he again scrambled up and pounded along the road, staring into the darkness, in case he should come upon a pile of wreckage, and under it . . .
He was again back at the cross-roads; it was here that she had begun to disappear into the darkness. He sat down on a milestone. It was quiet, utterly quiet. Above him were the cold stars. Was the dark meteor of the car flying along somewhere? Would there never be a sound, the cry of a bird, the barking of a dog in a village, some sign of life? But everything was bathed in the majestic silence of death. And this was the end, the silent, dark and icy end of everything—a desert surrounded by darkness and silence—an icy desert in which time stood still. If only it were the end of the world! The
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