# Drome/Chapter 28

Chapter 28
I Abandon Hope
At last Milton and I arose and proceeded to examine carefully this chamber of earven horrors. By the altar, another passage was discovered. Like the great chamber itself and the passage by which we had entered, this tunnel had been hewn out of the living rock by the hand of man. It was some sixty feet in length and conducted us into a small but most remarkable grotto—or, rather, a series of grottoes. We advanced, however, but little way there; a few minutes, and we were again in the hall of the dragon.
We continued, and finished, our examination of the place. Another passage was discovered, in the roof and leading to we knew not where. Then there were those stone horrors ranged along either wall; but I shall not attempt to describe those nightmare monstrosities, some of which, by the way, had two heads.
​The Dromans had drawn back some distance from the altar, and all had sunk down to a seat upon the floor, all save Drorathusa.
Our examination ended, we moved toward the little group, Milton looked at his watch.
"Midnight," said he.
As we drew near, Drorathusa suddenly raised a hand and made a significant motion toward the entrance. Those seated rose from the floor with an alacrity that astonished me. Evidently they were very anxious to quit this chamber of horrors. I was not sorry to do so myself.
"Shades of the great Ulysses," said I as we moved along in the rear, "are we going to keep up this wandering until we drop?"
"Just what I was wondering myself, Bill. I fancy, though, that our Dromans are beginning to think that a rest would not be inexpedient."
Shortly after issuing from the passage, the party came to a halt, and Drorathusa, to my profound thankfulness, announced that the time for rest and sleep had come.
"Sleep?" said I to myself. "Who can sleep in such a place and at such a time?"
From his pack, Narkus took a small silklike bundle; like the tent that Captain Amundsen left at the South Pole, one could have put it into a fair-sized pocket. The white-haired girl handed Narkus the sort of alpenstock which she carried, and, lo and presto, there was a tent for the ladies!
Rhodes and I betook ourselves off to a hollow in the wall, where we halted and disposed ourselves for rest. This disposition, however, was a very simple affair: we simply removed our packs and sat down on the floor—the softness of which by no means vied with that of swan's-down.
I drank a little water, but it seemed to augment rather than assuage my burning thirst. For a time I sat there, my aching body leaning back against the rock wall, my fevered, tortured mind revolving the grisly possibilities that confronted us. Meditation, however, only served to make our situation the more appalling. With an exclamation of despair, I lay down, longing for sleep's sweet oblivion. At this moment Narkus and the young man—whose name, by the way, was Thumbra—were seen approaching. They laid themselves down near by, their lanterns extinguished. We had shut off the electric lights, but our phosphorus-lamps, and those of the Dromans, shed their pale and ghostly light around.
Rhodes was sitting up, engaged in bringing his journal forward, as carefully and coolly as though he were in his library at home, instead of in this mysterious and fearful abode of blackness and silence, thousands of feet below the surface of the earth, far—though how far we could only guess—below the level of the sea itself.
When I closed my eyes, pictures came and went in a stream—pictures swaying, flashing, fading. The amazing, the incredible things that had happened, the things that probably were to happen—-oh, was it all only a dream?
I opened my eyes and raised myself up on an elbow. I saw Milton Rhodes bent over his book, writing, writing; I saw the recumbent forms of the two Dromans, whose heavy breathing told me that already they slept; over there was the tent, in it the beautiful, the Sibylline Drorathusa and her lovely companions—and I knew, alas, that it was not a dream!
I sank back with an inward groan and closed my eyes again. Oh, those thoughts that came thronging! If I could only go to sleep! A vision of treachery came, but it was not to trouble me now. No; Rhodes was right; our Dromans were lost. If ​only those other visions could be as easily banished as that one!
Ere long, however, those thronging thoughts and visions became hazy, confused, began to fade; and then suddenly they were blended with the monsters and the horrors of dreams.
It was 6 o'clock when I awoke. Rhodes was sitting up. He had, he told me, just awakened. One of the Dromans was stirring in his sleep and muttering something in cavernous and horrible tones. As I sat there and listened, a chill passed through me, so terrible were the sounds.
"I can't stand that," I exclaimed. "I'm going to wake him up. It's time we were moving, anyway."
"Yes," nodded Milton. "Surely, though, we'll find water today."
"Today! Where is your day in this place? It's night eternal. And for us, I'm afraid, it is good-night with a vengeance."
Ere long we were again under way. My canteen was now as dry as a bone, and I felt mighty sad. However, since I could not banish them, I endeavored to mask those dark and dire forebodings. When we set forth, it was with the hope that we might find, and be conducted by it to safety, the road by which those old worshipers had journeyed to and from that hall of the dragon. But not a vestige of such a route could we discover.
Hours passed. On and on we went, deeper and deeper. Noon came. No change. No one had a drop of water now. Rhodes and I estimated the distance traveled since quitting the temple of the dragon at ten miles and the descent at something like four thousand feet. This estimate, or rather guess, may, however, have been wide of the truth. We still were involved in the maddening intricacies of the labyrinth.
I confess that our situation began to assume an aspect that made my very soul turn sick and cold. Rhodes, however—divining perhaps what was in my mind—pointed out that we had not been lost very long, and that surely we would find water some place. A man, said he, in the equable temperature of this subterranean world, could live for quite a time without water. I had no doubt that a man could—if he were lying in bed! But we were not doing that; we were in constant motion. The arduous exercise that we were undergoing, our fatigue, the anxieties and fears that preyed upon the mind—each was contributing its quota to the dire and steady work of enervation.
No, I would fight against despair; but certainly I could imbibe no consolation, no strength, either mental or physical, from a deliberate blinking of facts. And one of the facts was that, unless we soon found water, ours would be that fate which has overtaken so many of those who have gone forth to search out the secrets of mysterious places.
During that halt for lunch—and what an awful lunch that was!—Milton brought forward his journal, and Drorathusa, by means of pictures drawn in the book, made it clear to us that they would never have missed the route had it not been for the loss of their beloved demon. That, of course, made Rhodes and me very sorry; but, if the demon had not been killed, we certainly should have been even more sorry—and, I'm afraid, in a worse place than this in which we now found ourselves.
This strange intelligence, too, reminded me of Grandfather Scranton's wonder as to how his angel and her demon had journeyed over rock, snowfield and glacier to the Tamahnowis Rocks through that, dense, blinding vapor. I understood that now—they were guided by the wonderful instinct of the ape-bat. How truly wonderful that instinct is, we were yet to learn. Little wonder that Drorathusa mourned the ​loss of her dear, beloved and hideous demon!
The bat has in all ages been the personification of repulsiveness, gloom and horror; and yet it is in many ways a very wonderful creature. For instance, it can fly through intricate passages with ease and certitude when blinded, avoiding any obstacle in or across its way as though in possession of perfect vision. No marvel, therefore, that some scientists have declared that the bat must possess a sixth sense! The accepted explanation, however, is that the creature discovers the objects, in the words of Cuvier, "by the sole diversity of aerial impressions."
However that may be, this wonderful faculty is possessed by the great ape-bats of Drome. Not that it is for this that they are valued by the Dromans. It is because it is impossible for an ape-bat to get lost. It matters not how long, how devious, how broken, savage, mysterious the way; the demon is never uncertain for one single moment. And a singular feature of this most singular fact is that the creature does not have to retrace the route itself, and it does not matter what time has elapsed. It may be a month, years; it is all the same to the demon. He may return to the point of departure by the outward trail, or he may go back in a bee-line or in a line as closely resembling a bee-line as the circumstances will permit.
From this it may easily be inferred how greatly the Dromans value these dreadful, repulsive creatures. When venturing out into the "lands of shadows" or into the caverns of utter darkness, these beasts are simply invaluable. In the "lands of shadows," they never fail to give warning of the approach of the wild ape-bats (those wolves of the air) or of other monsters; whilst, in the dark caverns—into which the wild bats sometimes wander for considerable distances—a man, though he may be utterly lost himself, knows that his demon will guide him safely back to the world of light.
In other ways, however, save as veritable Cerberi, they are of little use, are, indeed, objects of distrust and not a little dread. For they are, as a rule, of a most savage and uncertain temper. Not that the owner fears attack upon himself, though instances are not wanting in which master or mistress has been set upon. To its owner, a demon is truly doglike; but other people had better be careful.
"Since the loss of a demon on such a journey as this may spell disaster, I wonder," I said, "why they didn't bring along more than one."
"Food, Bill, food," returned Rhodes. "I am no authority, of course, on demonian dietetics, but I don't imagine that they feed the monster on canary-bird seed."
On we went, blindly and in desperation, on and on and deeper and deeper into the earth. At length there was a change, whether for good or ill we could not know; but we welcomed it, nevertheless—simply because it was a change. At last we were emerging from the labyrinth. But what lay ahead?
Yes, soon we were no longer in a maze of caverns, grottoes, passages, but in a wide and lofty tunnel. We had made our way down it but a little distance when an inscription was discovered on the right-hand wall. The discovery was made by Rhodes, who happened to be in the rear. A rectangular space, perhaps three feet by six, had been hewn perfectly smooth, and upon this rock tablet were many chiseled characters, characters utterly unlike any we had seen. Before this spot we clustered in hope and questioning. It was at once patent, however, that our Dromans could make nothing whatever of the writing. But we regarded this discovery ​as a happy augury and pressed on with a lighter step. On to bitter disappointment.
Hours passed. We were still toiling down that awful tunnel.
At last—it was then 9 o'clock—the way became very difficult. The rock had been broken, rent, smashed by some terrible convulsion. The scene was indescribably weird and savage. And there we halted, sank down upon the rocky floor. Rhodes and Drorathusa evinced an admirable nonchalance, but in the eyes of the others burned the dull light of despair. And perhaps, too, in my own. I tried to hide it, but I could not disguise it from myself—the numbing, maddening fact that I had abandoned hope.
For a time I lay watching Rhodes, who was writing, writing in his journal. How could he do it? Who could ever find the record? At any rate, even though found, it could never be read, for the finder would be a Dro-man. It made me angry to see a man doing a thing so absurd. But I bridled speech, curbed that rising and insensate anger of mine, rolled over, closed my eyes and, strange to say, was soon asleep.
But that sleep of mine was an unbroken succession of horrors—horrors at last ended by an awakening as horrible.
Once more I was in that hewn chamber, once more I stood before the great dragon. But we had been wrong: the monster was alive. Down he sprang as I turned to flee, sank his teeth into my shoulder, raised his head high into the air and shook me as a cat shakes a mouse. Then suddenly I knew that it was not all a dream.
Teeth had sunk into my shoulder. I struggled madly, but the jaws only closed the harder. And, horror of horrors, the spot in which I had lain down was now in utter blackness. Then I was wide-awake: the teeth were Rhodes' fingers, and I heard his voice above me in the darkness:
"Not a word, Bill—unless guarded."
"What is it?" I whispered, sitting up. "And where are our phosphorus-lamps?"
"In their cylinders," was Rhodes' low answer. "We want to see without being seen, that is why. I can turn on the electric, of course, at any instant. I wish the Dromans had been nearer, on this side of that rock mass; I would have darkened theirs too."
"Without being seen?" I queried. "In heaven's name, Milton, what does it mean?"
"I don't know. Got your revolver handy?"
"Yes."
"Good! Keep it so!"
"But what is it?"
"Did you," said he, "notice that passage in the opposite wall, a few yards back?"
I whispered that I had.
"Well," said Milton Rhodes, "there is something in there. And it's coming this way!"