"Yes, O Master. He is bound wrist and ankle."
"Good! And the excavation?"
"Proceeds on schedule, Master. By dawn it should be finished."
"That is well. For if he still grows—"
"He does, O Master!"
"—dawn will be none too soon. The cavern will no longer hold him."
Bud whispered to his friend and superior, "Say, what goes on here? What are they talking about?"
"If I'm not greatly mistaken," answered Rocky, "the thing for which those manacles were made."
Verification of his guess came almost immediately. Again their guards prodded them forward, and behind Grossman they entered a passageway dipping into the side of the hill. Through an ancient tunnel, damp and malodorous, they marched, debouching finally into a gigantic cavern ... a huge bubble of emptiness blown into the solid rock in some forgotten geologic age of change.
And there at last before them stood....