By the time we reach chapter 8 of And Then There Were None, two of the guests, Anthony Marston and Mrs. Ethel Rogers, have already died. It's frighteningly obvious to everyone that they didn't commit suicide but were in fact murdered. A sense of urgency creeps in as well as fear. It would seem that there's a killer loose on the island, and he must be caught as soon as possible.

Dr. Armstrong, Blore, and Lombard decide to search the island and see if they can hunt down the man they regard as a “raving maniac.” Even so, Blore is starting to think that the murderer might actually be one of the guests. Instead of wandering all over the island, he thinks, perhaps they'd be better off searching the mansion instead.

In any case, the three men continue their search. Even if it turns out that the murderer is one of the guests, the powerful life-force that still rages within them drives them on to search the island and apprehend the culprit. They've grown rather attached to their lives and are not about to let go of them without a fight.

The same, however, cannot be said about poor old General Macarthur. He's in a frightful state. It seems that, unlike Blore, Lombard, and Armstrong, he's completely lost the will to live. With two people dead, he's become dangerously fatalistic. He seems to have a sense that he's doomed to die and that there's absolutely nothing he can do about it.

Macarthur's parlous mental state is much in evidence when Blore, Lombard, and Armstrong bump into him while they're searching the island for the killer. Macarthur's standing there all alone, staring vacantly out to sea, mumbling “there is so little time” to himself over and over again, and that no one should disturb him. Little wonder, then, that Blore thinks that Macarthur's gone completely insane.