Statues. Endless numbers of statues, down here in the darkness underneath the city....
He stopped, bracing himself against his captors, gripping the hot rock with his bare feet.
"This is a catacomb," he said. "Those aren't statues, they're bodies, dead things sitting up."
"Come on," said Galt. "Come on, and laugh!"
They took him, and there were too many to fight. And Trevor knew that it was not them he had to fight. Something was waiting for him down in that catacomb. It had had his mind once. It would—
They were approaching the end of the long hall. The sickly light from the fumaroles showed the last of the lines of seated figures—had they died there like that, sitting up, or had they been brought here afterward? The rows on each side ended evenly, the last chairs exactly opposite each other.
But against the blank end wall was a solitary seat of stone, facing down the full gloomy length of the hall, and on it sat a manlike shape of alabaster, very still, the stony hands folded rigidly upon the stony thighs. A figure no different from the others, except....
Except that the eyes were still alive.
The Korins dropped back a little. All but Galt. He stayed beside Trevor, his head bent, his mouth sullen and nervous, not looking up at all. And Trevor stared into the remote and sombre eyes that were like two pieces of carnelian in that pale alabaster face, and yet were living, sentient, full of a deep and alien sorrow.