So Stan, after screwing his head sideways, raised one eye to the fullest extent and looked wonderingly up for that great spider. But he did not see it, for the simple reason that the spider was not there.
But he saw something else, which brought his full senses back in an instant, making him utter a hoarse cry, and, scrambling up, bound right across to the other side of the great bamboo cage into which he had been thrust.
It was sufficiently startling, and must have had a similar effect upon one older and sturdier than he.
For as he brought his eye to bear, there, just above his scalp, was suspended what at the first glance through the dim light seemed to be the head and neck of a large snake, softly dancing up and down before descending to touch his hair. But that was only his first idea, for the second glance was sufficient to make him grasp the fact that it was no snake, but a long, thin-fingered hand with quivering, pliable fingers, smooth below but hairy at the back, and at the end of a very long, thin, hairy arm which had been thrust between two upright bamboos.
It was only momentary, for as Stan uttered his hoarse cry the hand darted out of sight as rapidly as if it had been made of india-rubber, to be followed by the sound of a bump as if its owner had made a bound across the part of the divided cage in which Stan now stood with every nerve quivering, and his brain actively at work bringing back the incidents of the previous day.
“Another prisoner,” thought Stan, and he shuddered with horror, for slight as was the glance he had obtained, it was enough to raise up plenty of horrors. The hand and arm were frightfully attenuated, and he felt that if this were a fellow-prisoner, the poor creature must have suffered the most terrible starvation to bring him to such a state. He was a prisoner too, and so horrible were his feelings for the next few moments that the confusion and semi-delirium of the previous night threatened to return.
But after he had rested, his thoughts grew calmer again in the silence and the soft grey light.
He was a prisoner, but an English prisoner, he felt, and the Chinese guard would not dare to injure him.
He gazed rather wildly at the place from which he had leaped, to see upright bamboos very close together, but with space enough between for a very thin hand and arm to be thrust through; and now the disposition to speak to one who must, whoever he was, be a fellow-sufferer came uppermost.
But he did not speak; his thoughts took another direction, and he mastered his position.