Yes, I heard it. “Gurgle, gurgle.” Ever the same deep sound—the dull keynote to hell.
Then gradually, slowly and mysteriously, the darkness gave way to a dull red light. It lit up the arched passages that branched out in every direction from where we stood, like the crypt of some cathedral.
“They’re all buried down here,” she whispered again.
Gurgle—gurgle—gurgle. There flowed the black stream, turned to dullest red, along every aisle and dimly-shining passage. No sound of footfall ever rose among those arches. Nothing but the awful lapping of the stream. She stepped into a boat which was anchored there, and I followed.
Of itself it loosed from mooring and floated silently into the central channel.
Oh, hell! oh, terrible, silent, twisting, twining power of hell! Remorseless cruel power that clings and holds, and never will give way but by inhuman power! Oh, devils! dyed and steeped in cruelty and hate! Luring each willing victim to the brink in hateful silence, till the last long shriek and counter-laugh are heard! What good can ever rise from all the torture you inflict? Destroying evil with worse evil, burning out with white heat that which yourselves implanted!
Oh, giddy, heedless mortals treading the brilliant path or easy, unmindful of the gurgling warning stream!
Oh! rise! rise! but there—what hope is there to give in hell? It belongs only to the earth.
Such terrible thoughts overfilled me as we sailed along that I discharged them with a heavy sigh. ’Twas strange the way the weird low sound of misery re-echoed through the vaults. A hundred sighs seemed raised by it, each breathing to the other its own lone fearful tale, and then all died away; yet when all died it seemed as if my own still wandered round unrestful, finding no grave.
“Listen,” continued Vestné, again laying her hand upon my arm as if to steady me; and indeed it was as well, for at her word there rang out a cry so terrible and so prolonged that it had almost unnerved me. The horrid repetition struck chill to the very centre of my being; no creature writhing under the lash could have ever uttered more fearful cries. To try to deaden the sound was impossible, till of itself it weakened and died away with a heavy childish sob of pain. I looked at her and saw the cruel light in her eyes and the smile on her lips.