I shrugged my shoulders. The creature stood erect once more, and made a comprehensive gesture.
“This?” he said,—“you must not judge by this. It is the Holy of Holies, to which none has access but the High Priest of the Catacombs—and such as he favours.”
“And what, in a rude age, keeps it sacred?”
He swept his torch right and left.
“Look, then!” said he.
We lay in a vaulted chamber hewn out of the rock. On all sides I fancied I caught dim vision of the mouths of innumerable low tunnels that exhaled a mist of profound night.
“Knowledge!” exclaimed the fearful man; “the age-long lore of one that hath learnt his every footstep in this maze of oubliettes. There are beaten tracks here and there. Here and there a fool has been known to leave them. It may be days or weeks before I happen across his body—the eyes slipping forward of their lids, his mouth puckered out of shape from sucking and gnawing at the knuckles of his hands.”
“It is terrible! And none comes hither but thou?”
“I, and the beasts of blood that must not be denied. When they hunt, I lead; therefore it is well to win my favour.”
Carinne hurriedly raised herself. She threw her arms about me.