AN OCCURRENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE
by Ambrose Bierce
III
As Peyton Fahrquhar fell straight downward through the
bridge he lost consciousness and was as one already dead.
From this state he was awakened -- ages later, it seemed to
him -- by the pain of a sharp pressure upon his throat,
followed by a sense of suffocation. Keen, poignant agonies
seemed to shoot from his neck downward through every fiber of
his body and limbs. These pains appeared to flash along well
defined lines of ramification and to beat with an
inconceivably rapid periodicity. They seemed like streams of
pulsating fire heating him to an intolerable temperature. As
to his head, he was conscious of nothing but a feeling of
fullness -- of congestion. These sensations were
unaccompanied by thought. The intellectual part of his
nature was already effaced; he had power only to feel, and
feeling was torment. He was conscious of motion.
Encompassed in a luminous cloud, of which he was now merely
the fiery heart, without material substance, he swung
through unthinkable arcs of oscillation, like a vast
pendulum. Then all at once, with terrible suddenness, the
light about him shot upward with the noise of a loud splash;
a frightful roaring was in his ears, and all was cold and
dark. The power of thought was restored; he knew that the
rope had broken and he had fallen into the stream. There was
no additional strangulation; the noose about his neck
was already suffocating him and kept the water from his
lungs. To die of hanging at the bottom of a river! -- the
idea seemed to him ludicrous. He opened his eyes in the
darkness and saw above him a gleam of light, but how distant,
how inaccessible! He was still sinking, for the light became
fainter and fainter until it was a mere glimmer. Then it
began to grow and brighten, and he knew that he was rising
toward the surface -- knew it with reluctance, for he was now
very comfortable. "To be hanged and drowned," he thought,
"that is not so bad; but I do not wish to be shot. No; I
will not be shot; that is not fair."
He was not conscious of an effort, but a sharp pain in his
wrist apprised him that he was trying to free his hands. He
gave the struggle his attention, as an idler might observe
the feat of a juggler, without interest in the outcome. What
splendid effort! -- what magnificent, what superhuman
strength! Ah, that was a fine endeavor! Bravo! The cord
fell away; his arms parted and floated upward, the hands
dimly seen on each side in the growing light. He watched
them with a new interest as first one and then the other
pounced upon the noose at his neck. They tore it away and
thrust it fiercely aside, its undulations resembling those of
a water snake. "Put it back, put it back!" He thought he
shouted these words to his hands, for the undoing of the
noose had been succeeded by the direst pang that he had yet
experienced. His neck ached horribly; his brain was on fire,
his heart, which had been fluttering faintly, gave a great
leap, trying to force itself out at his mouth. His whole
body was racked and wrenched with an insupportable anguish!
But his disobedient hands gave no heed to the command. They
beat the water vigorously with quick, downward strokes,
forcing him to the surface. He felt his head emerge; his
eyes were blinded by the sunlight; his chest expanded
convulsively, and with a supreme and crowning agony his lungs
engulfed a great draught of air, which instantly he expelled
in a shriek!
He was now in full possession of his physical senses. They
were, indeed, preternaturally keen and alert. Something in
the awful disturbance of his organic system had so exalted
and refined them that they made record of things never before
perceived. He felt the ripples upon his face and heard their
separate sounds as they struck. He looked at the forest on
the bank of the stream, saw the individual trees, the leaves
and the veining of each leaf -- he saw the very insects upon
them: the locusts, the brilliant bodied flies, the gray
spiders stretching their webs from twig to twig. He noted
the prismatic colors in all the dewdrops upon a million
blades of grass. The humming of the gnats that danced above
the eddies of the stream, the beating of the dragon flies'
wings, the strokes of the water spiders' legs, like oars
which had lifted their boat -- all these made audible
music. A fish slid along beneath his eyes and he heard the
rush of its body parting the water.
He had come to the surface facing down the stream; in a
moment the visible world seemed to wheel slowly round,
himself the pivotal point, and he saw the bridge, the fort,
the soldiers upon the bridge, the captain, the sergeant, the
two privates, his executioners. They were in silhouette
against the blue sky. They shouted and gesticulated,
pointing at him. The captain had drawn his pistol, but did
not fire; the others were unarmed. Their movements were
grotesque and horrible, their forms gigantic.
Suddenly he heard a sharp report and something struck the
water smartly within a few inches of his head, spattering his
face with spray. He heard a second report, and saw one of
the sentinels with his rifle at his shoulder, a light cloud
of blue smoke rising from the muzzle. The man in the water
saw the eye of the man on the bridge gazing into his own
through the sights of the rifle. He observed that it was a
gray eye and remembered having read that gray eyes were
keenest, and that all famous marksmen had them.
Nevertheless, this one had missed.
A counter-swirl had caught Fahrquhar and turned him half
round; he was again looking at the forest on the bank
opposite the fort. The sound of a clear, high voice in a
monotonous singsong now rang out behind him and came across
the water with a distinctness that pierced and subdued all
other sounds, even the beating of the ripples in his ears.
Although no soldier, he had frequented camps enough to know
the dread significance of that deliberate, drawling,
aspirated chant; the lieutenant on shore was taking a part in
the morning's work. How coldly and pitilessly -- with what
an even, calm intonation, presaging, and enforcing
tranquility in the men -- with what accurately measured
interval fell those cruel words:
"Company! . . . Attention! . . . Shoulder arms! . . . Ready!
. . . Aim! . . . Fire!"
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