At last I roused myself from my inaction, and turning seaward walked straight into the water. The water was very shallow at first. I was thirty yards out before the waves reached to my waist. Dimly I could see the intertidal creatures darting away from my feet.
“What are you doing, man?” cried Montgomery.
I turned, standing waist deep, and stared at them. Montgomery stood panting at the margin of the water. His face was bright-red with exertion, his long flaxen hair blown about his head, and his dropping nether lip showed his irregular teeth. Moreau was just coming up, his face pale and firm, and the dog at his hand barked at me. Both men had heavy whips. Farther up the beach stared the beast men.
“What am I doing? I am going to drown myself,” said I.
Montgomery and Moreau looked at each other. “Why?” asked Moreau.
“Because that is better than being tortured by you.”
“I told you so,” said Montgomery, and Moreau said something in a low tone.
“What makes you think I shall torture you?” asked Moreau.
“What I saw,” I said. “And those—yonder.”
“Hush!” said Moreau, and held up his hand.
“I will not,” said I. “They were men: what are they now? I at least will not be like them.”
I looked past my interlocutors. Up the beach were M’ling, Montgomery’s attendant, and one of the white-swathed brutes from the boat. Farther up, in the shadow of the trees, I saw my little ape-man, and behind him some other dim figures.