Read "The Garden of Survival" by Algernon Blackwood online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
THERE was, then, you will remember, but an interval of minutes between the accident and the temporary recovery of consciousness, between that recovery again and the moment when the head fell forward on my knee and she was gone. That "recovery" of consciousness I feel bound to question, as you shall shortly hear. Among such curious things I am at sea admittedly, yet I must doubt for ever that the eyes which peered so strangely into mine were those of Marion herself as I had always known her. You will, at any rate, allow the confession, and believe it true, that I did not recognize her quite. Consciousness there was, indubitably, but whether it was "recovery" of consciousness is another matter, and a problem that I must for ever question though I cannot ever set it confidently at rest.
It almost seemed as though a larger, grander, yet somehow a less personal, soul looked forth through the fading eyes and used the troubled breath.