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III . THE DAYS OF IMPRISONMENT . The arrival of a second fighting - machine drove us from our peephole into the scullery , for we feared that from his elevation the Martian might see down upon us behind our barrier . At a later date we began to feel less in danger of their eyes , for to an eye in the dazzle of the sunlight outside our refuge must have been blank blackness , but at first the slightest suggestion of approach drove us into the scullery in heart - throbbing retreat . Yet terrible as was the danger we incurred , the attraction of peeping was for both of us irresistible . And I recall now with a sort of wonder that , in spite of the infinite danger in which we were between starvation and a still more terrible death , we could yet struggle bitterly for that horrible privilege of sight . We would race across the kitchen in a grotesque way between eagerness and the dread of making a noise , and strike each other , and thrust and kick , within a few inches of exposure . The fact is that we had absolutely incompatible dispositions and habits of thought and action , and our danger and isolation only accentuated the incompatibility . At Halliford I had already come to hate the curate’s trick of helpless exclamation , his stupid rigidity of mind . His endless muttering monologue vitiated every effort I made to think out a line of action , and drove me at times , thus pent up and intensified , almost to the verge of craziness . He was as lacking in restraint as a silly woman . He would weep for hours together , and I verily believe that to the very end this spoiled child of life thought his weak tears in some way efficacious . And I would sit in the darkness unable to keep my mind off him by reason of his importunities . He ate more than I did , and it was in vain I pointed out that our only chance of life was to stop in the house until the Martians had done with their pit , that in that long patience a time might presently come when we should need food . He ate and drank impulsively in heavy meals at long intervals . He slept little . As the days wore on , his utter carelessness of any consideration so intensified our distress and danger that I had , much as I loathed doing it , to resort to threats , and at last to blows . That brought him to reason for a time . But he was one of those weak creatures , void of pride , timorous , anæmic , hateful souls , full of shifty cunning , who face neither God nor man , who face not even themselves . It is disagreeable for me to recall and write these things , but I set them down that my story may lack nothing . Those who have escaped the dark and terrible aspects of life will find my brutality , my flash of rage in our final tragedy , easy enough to blame ; for they know what is wrong as well as any , but not what is possible to tortured men . But those who have been under the shadow , who have gone down at last to elemental things , will have a wider charity . And while within we fought out our dark , dim contest of whispers , snatched food and drink , and gripping hands and blows , without , in the pitiless sunlight of that terrible June , was the strange wonder , the unfamiliar routine of the Martians in the pit . Let me return to those first new experiences of mine . After a long time I ventured back to the peephole , to find that the new - comers had been reinforced by the occupants of no fewer than three of the fighting - machines .
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