A Voice That Stopped Me at the Right Moment

I was hiking alone in the Shawnee National Forest in southern Illinois, a trail I had done a dozen times. It was late afternoon and I was moving quickly to get back to the trailhead before dark. At one point I heard — and I mean audibly heard — a single word spoken clearly beside me: Stop. I stopped. I looked down. Two feet ahead of me the trail dropped away where erosion had eaten through the edge. The overhang of grass and roots looked like solid ground but was hollow underneath. If I had continued at pace I would have gone through it and down a fifteen-foot drop onto rock. I stood there for a long time. There was no one on the trail. I had not spoken. The voice was calm and clear and not my own internal monologue — I know what that sounds like. I have spent a lot of time since then thinking about what happened. I am not given to dramatic claims. But I heard something, and it saved me.