We will see each other in the morning.”

“Good night,” Alec said. As tired as he was, he knew it would be a long time before he slept, if sleep came at all. At least he would rest while awaiting the first light of dawn.

NIGHTMARE!
9

Alec stood before the open window of his second-floor bedroom and stared into the night. It was a beautiful evening with a gigantic span of sky spread before him and a full moon just beginning to rise above the saw grass. To the southwest he could see the high humpbacked outline of a hammock which he believed was the captain’s objective, the home of Koví.

Certainly he did not believe any part of such a fantastic story! Yet he knew that his own vivid imagination made him very vulnerable to the captain’s ramblings.

He turned his mind to other thoughts, knowing he’d get no sleep otherwise. The seemingly endless miles of saw grass glistened beneath the star-spangled sky. He saw many hammocks studding the swamp, like islands in a watery wilderness. He stared at the moon and was conscious of the stillness. Such a world belonged more to night than to day, he decided. It was almost like being alone in the universe.

Here in the Everglades, nature would forever triumph over man, regardless of how many drainage ditches were dug. The swamp was vast and confident in its solitude.

Alec wondered why he had been frightened by the swamp during the day but not at night. Perhaps it was the great silence, that and the deep peace that seemed to accompany it. He listened. Any sound would carry miles with bell-like clarity on such a night. But he heard nothing, no shrill cries of distant birds or receding echoes. He was alone, the vast swampland calmly ignoring his presence or, perhaps, accepting him as a friend.

He believed he would be able to sleep. Leaving the window, he went to his bed and stretched out on it, fully clothed. He closed his eyes and kept his thoughts on the great silence outside the window, waiting for sleep to come. It had been a long, hard day and he was very tired.

He didn’t know how long he lay there or, actually, whether or not he had slept, when he saw a pair of eyes staring at him in the darkness. They were startlingly cold and dark—like obsidian. He believed it was the captain and asked quickly, “What are you doing here?”

He attempted to get up but found he could not rise from the bed. He struggled but could not move. It was then he realized that he must be asleep and dreaming. But no dream had ever been so vivid to him before.

He began struggling again and found he was able to wiggle his body across the bed but not rise from it. Nor could he tear his gaze away from the eyes that held him. He believed there was a living presence in the room with him but he did not know whether it was the captain or not. He wanted only to rise and run, yet he could not. And try as he might, he could not wake up to rid himself of the horrible dream.

He opened his mouth but nothing came forth although he shouted as loud as he could. He continued struggling, working his body from one end of the bed to the other in an attempt to rouse himself from his dream. Always the eyes followed him, moving with him, holding him.

He was able to think with a clarity he had not thought possible in a dream.