The next minute, in an agony of spirit that seemed too hard to bear, his outstretched candle lit up Panton’s face, which was farther illumined by the lights the others bore.
“My light’s burned out,” cried Panton, placing his lips close to Drew’s ear. “I say, what a row the water makes.”
The effort to speak grew troublesome, and signs were resorted to. Fresh candles were lit, and in spite of an objection raised by Oliver, Panton was for going on again.
“We must see the falls now we are so near,” he shouted. “We can’t be many yards away. We’ll come better provided with lights another time.”
Starting on again, but going very carefully, Panton continued his way onward pretty close to the edge of the smooth river which ran now several feet below the level on which they walked. And as he held out his candle, so as to clearly see the edge, the light gleamed fitfully from the black glassy surface of the stream.
All at once Panton found himself at an angle of the rock, where a second stream joined the one by which they had come, and as the others joined him, it seemed as if their progress was at an end. This second stream was a surprise, for it was larger than the one by their right, and coming as it did almost at right angles from their left, it was puzzling as to whence it could come, for it did not seem possible that it could have issued from the crater lake.
And there they stood in a noise that was now deafening, holding their lights on high, and trying to pierce the black darkness in front, but of course in vain.
A peculiar fact struck Oliver now, as he stood pretty close to the lava edge of the angular platform upon which they had halted, and this was, that the flames of all their candles were drawn away from them toward where the water of the conjoined streams must be falling in one plunge down into some terrible gulf. He knew at once that this was caused by a strong, steady current of air setting towards the falls, and in his uneasiness he was about to point out to Panton that their candles were rapidly burning away, when the latter suddenly lit his remaining piece of magnesium wire, and the next minute they were all straining their eyes, and now looking into a misty glare of light, right in front—evidently the mist rising from the churned-up water—or now upon their grotesque black shadows, cast by the white-smoked magnesium upon the floor and the ceiling far above.
But there was no sign of the water itself, only the conformation of the lava stream whose edge could be seen upon the other side of the second river at least thirty feet away.
“What’s to be done?” said Panton at last, as the magnesium burned out and all was once more black darkness.