Chapter 26
I could set down no adequate record of those hours which followed. It was late now, and yet on and on we went, mile after mile, deeper and deeper but only, it seemed, to involve ourselves the more hopelessly in the dread mysteries of that fearsome place. I wondered if it was my imagination that made it so, but certainly the confusion of those chambers and caverns seemed to become only confusion and the worse confounded.
At last and suddenly came the discovery.
We had entered a long and narrow chamber and were drawing near the end, Rhodes and I wondering if we should find an exit there. Of a sudden there was a sharp exclamation from the lips of Drorathusa, who was some little distance in advance—an exclamation that fetched me up on the instant.
She had stopped and was pointing towards the left-hand wall, her attitude and the look upon her face such that I started and a sudden fear shot through me.
"What in the world can it be?" I said. "I see nothing but rock and shadows and blackness. What has she found?"
Milton Rhodes made no answer. He was moving forward. I followed. A moment, and he was beside the Dromans, his light turned full upon the wall.
"Look at that, Bill!" said he.
I moved to his side, and we stood there gazing, for some moments motionless and silent.
"Well, Bill," he queried at last, "what do you think of that? We are not the first human beings to stand in this spot."
"But probably many centuries have passed since any human being stood here," I said, "and gazed upon that entrance—went into it. I wonder what it leads to. Why should men have cut that passage into the living rock? In such a horrible place. And how do we know that it was made by men? In this underground world, there may be intelligent beings that are not men."
"Well, that is possible, of course," Milton nodded.
The entrance was about four feet in width by eight in height. Above it, there was some striking sculpturing, evidently work of a mystical character. Its meaning was an utter mystery to Rhodes and me, but not, I thought, to our Dromans. Very little dust had accumulated, though, as I have good reason to believe, many, many centuries had passed since that spot was abandoned to unbroken blackness and silence.
Many were the pictures that came and went as we stood there and looked and wondered. Who had cut this passage into the living rock? In what lost age of a people now perhaps lost as well? And for what purpose had they hewn it?
"Well," I said to myself, "possibly the answer to that question awaits us there within."
Rhodes and I moved over to the entrance, and he sent the strong rays of his electric light into the passage.
"About fifty feet long," he observed, "and evidently it enters another chamber."
We started in. We had taken but a few steps, however, when we stopped and turned our look back to the Dromans.
"Not coming," said Rhodes.
Why did they stand hesitant, with that strange look in their eyes and upon their faces? Even the angel was affected. Affected by what? By the mere mystery of the place?
"I wonder what is the matter with them," I said. "Why are they staying out there? I tell you, Milton, I don't like this at all. What's the matter with them?"
"Superstitious dread or something, I suppose," returned Rhodes. "Well, it ill becomes a scientist to let superstition stay his steps, to turn back even if a black cat crosses his path; and so on we go."
And on we went into the passage. When we were nearly through it, I glanced back. The Dromans had not moved.
"Look here!" I said, coming to an abrupt stop.
"What is it now, Bill?"
"Maybe this is a trap."
"A trap? How can it be a trap?"
"How in the world do I know that? But to me the whole business has a queer and suspicious look, I tell you."
"How so?"
"How so? Why, maybe theybroughtus to this hole. We don't know what's in there."
"Neither do they," Milton said.
"Maybe theydo," I told him. "Maybe they aren't lost at all. Maybe it's all make-believe. Why don't they come in, too? What are they standing out there for, standing and waiting—waiting? What are they waiting for? Probably for their chance to steal away and leave us to our fate!"
"My gosh, Bill," said Milton Rhodes, "your imagination goes like a jumping-jack!"
"Heaven help us if that's what you think when a man would be cautious and watchful!"
"Cautious and watchful. Yes, certainly we want to be cautious and watchful. After all, there may be something in what you say.
"But," he added the next moment, "not much, I think. No, Bill. This is not a trap. There is no faking about it: the Dromansarelost."
"I don't like it," I told him. "Why don't they come on in?"
"Goodness knows, Bill. Why won't some people sit down to a table if the party numbers thirteen? And why shouldwestand hesitant? Suppose that they do plan to steal away from us. I don't believe it, but suppose that they do. What then? Are we going to run after them, like lambs after little Bopeep? Not I, oldtillicum. If they are as treacherous a lot as that, the quicker we part company the better. For, sooner or later, their chance would come."
"There may be something in that," I admitted. "Lead on, Macduff."
A moment or two, and we had stepped from the passage and out into a great and lofty chamber.
"Great Heaven!" I cried, my right hand going to my revolver. "What—what is that thing?"
Rhodes made no answer. He stood peering intently.
"Look out!" I cried, pulling out my weapon and drawing back towards the entrance. "It's moving!"