midnight
And now , maddened with fever , intoxicated with the strange stimulation of the berries I too had been eating , I no longer fled in fear , but in its place came a wild exhilaration , and I shouted aloud as I flogged the panting horses to further efforts . Now , to my disordered brain , the sandstorm was a legion of pursuing fiends , that snatched at me from every gust and eddy ; now , too , they were gaining on us , and I shrieked and fought with the imaginary demons as , in spite of the speed of the horses , the storm gained on us and enveloped us more and more at every stride . And so for an eternity I seemed to fly , now hemmed in with blinding sand , seeing nothing , knowing nothing but an overpowering desire to escape from the clutching fiends around , tortured with thirst maddened , screaming . Dark now , as at midnight , except when a flash of forked lightning burst through the driving chaos ; now I had burst free again , as the storm veered in another direction , yet still it threatened me and still I galloped on . Then a snort of fright from the horses , a wild plunge forward that almost threw me from the saddle , a sense of falling , a stunning crash that seemed to me to be the bursting asunder of the world 's very foundations and then a merciful oblivion . I awoke to the tortures of the damned , crushed , broken and in agonizing pain , and with the aasvogels tearing at my face . Pinned to the earth as by some great weight , my hands were fortunately still free ; and my revolver still in its holster ; and a few shots sent the lewd , cowardly birds flapping away .