"Well," asked Rob, while Harry Harkness skillfully skinned the lion, "shall we go on or turn back?"
"We'll go on!" shouted everybody.
"If you guarantee no more scares," amended Tubby.
With the tawny pelt slung over Harry's broad shoulder, the little party therefore pressed on into the darkness.
"We'll have to hurry," said Rob suddenly, regarding his candle, of which not much was left.
"How far do you guess it is from the entrance?" questioned Harry.
"I've no idea," was Rob's rejoinder. "I half believe now we were wrong to try to find a way out this way."
He said this in a low voice, so as not to alarm the others, who were behind the leaders. It did indeed begin to look as if the young explorers had placed themselves in a predicament.
Presently, however, the air began to grow fresher, and, uttering a cheer at this sign that they were near to daylight, the lads rushed forward. Still cheering, they emerged into a place where the passage broadened, and in another moment would have been out of the farther end of the tunnel but for an unexpected happening that occurred at that moment.
Rob, who had been slightly in advance, gave the first warning of the new alarm. As the welcome daylight poured upon his face, and he gazed into a sort of cup-like valley beyond the passage mouth, he heard a sudden "z-i-ip!" past his ear, like the whizzing of a locust.