XV The Time Traveller’s Return chapter 15 paragraph 2 among 5 paragraphs
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“I saw one little thing that seemed odd to me. I think I have told
you that when I set out, before my velocity became very high, Mrs. Watchett
had walked across the room, travelling, as it seemed to me, like a rocket.
As I returned, I passed again across that minute when she traversed the
laboratory. But now her every motion appeared to be the exact inversion of
her previous ones. The door at the lower end opened, and she glided quietly
up the laboratory, back foremost, and disappeared behind the door by which
she had previously entered. Just before that I seemed to see Hillyer for a
moment; but he passed like a flash.
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“Then I stopped the machine, and saw about me again the old
familiar laboratory, my tools, my appliances just as I had left them. I got
off the thing very shakily, and sat down upon my bench. For several minutes
I trembled violently. Then I became calmer. Around me was my old workshop
again, exactly as it had been. I might have slept there, and the whole
thing have been a dream.
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“And yet, not exactly! The thing had started from the south-east
corner of the laboratory. It had come to rest again in the north-west,
against the wall where you saw it. That gives you the exact distance from
my little lawn to the pedestal of the White Sphinx, into which the Morlocks
had carried my machine.
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“For a time my brain went stagnant. Presently I got up and came
through the passage here, limping, because my heel was still painful, and
feeling sorely begrimed. I saw the Pall Mall Gazette on the table by
the door. I found the date was indeed today, and looking at the timepiece,
saw the hour was almost eight o’clock. I heard your voices and the
clatter of plates. I hesitated—I felt so sick and weak. Then I
sniffed good wholesome meat, and opened the door on you. You know the rest.
I washed, and dined, and now I am telling you the story.
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XVI After the Story
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“I know,” he said, after a pause, “that all this will be
absolutely incredible to you, but to me the one incredible thing is that I
am here tonight in this old familiar room looking into your friendly faces
and telling you these strange adventures.” He looked at the Medical
Man. “No. I cannot expect you to believe it. Take it as a
lie—or a prophecy. Say I dreamed it in the workshop. Consider I have
been speculating upon the destinies of our race, until I have hatched this
fiction. Treat my assertion of its truth as a mere stroke of art to enhance
its interest. And taking it as a story, what do you think of it?”
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He took up his pipe, and began, in his old accustomed manner, to tap
with it nervously upon the bars of the grate. There was a momentary
stillness. Then chairs began to creak and shoes to scrape upon the carpet.
I took my eyes off the Time Traveller’s face, and looked round at his
audience. They were in the dark, and little spots of colour swam before
them. The Medical Man seemed absorbed in the contemplation of our host. The
Editor was looking hard at the end of his cigar—the sixth. The
Journalist fumbled for his watch. The others, as far as I remember, were
motionless.
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The Editor stood up with a sigh. “What a pity it is you’re
not a writer of stories!” he said, putting his hand on the Time
Traveller’s shoulder.
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The Time Traveller turned to us. “Where are the matches?” he
said. He lit one and spoke over his pipe, puffing. “To tell you the
truth... I hardly believe it myself..... And yet...”
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His eye fell with a mute inquiry upon the withered white flowers upon
the little table. Then he turned over the hand holding his pipe, and I saw
he was looking at some half-healed scars on his knuckles.
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The Medical Man rose, came to the lamp, and examined the flowers.
“The gynæceum’s odd,” he said. The Psychologist leant
forward to see, holding out his hand for a specimen.
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“It’s a curious thing,” said the Medical Man;
“but I certainly don’t know the natural order of these flowers.
May I have them?”
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The Time Traveller put his hand to his head. He spoke like one who was
trying to keep hold of an idea that eluded him. “They were put into
my pocket by Weena, when I travelled into Time.” He stared round the
room. “I’m damned if it isn’t all going. This room and
you and the atmosphere of every day is too much for my memory. Did I ever
make a Time Machine, or a model of a Time Machine? Or is it all only a
dream? They say life is a dream, a precious poor dream at times—but I
can’t stand another that won’t fit. It’s madness. And
where did the dream come from? … I must look at that machine. If there is
one!”
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He caught up the lamp swiftly, and carried it, flaring red, through the
door into the corridor. We followed him. There in the flickering light of
the lamp was the machine sure enough, squat, ugly, and askew, a thing of
brass, ebony, ivory, and translucent glimmering quartz. Solid to the
touch—for I put out my hand and felt the rail of it—and with
brown spots and smears upon the ivory, and bits of grass and moss upon the
lower parts, and one rail bent awry.
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