Martin with difficulty maintained a disinterested expression. He recovered his stride, and they joined the others beneath the overhanging elephant rock. Moto and Ichi held for a moment a chattering interchange of their native speech.
Martin peered into this other opening, his agitated mind half-expecting to see the startling vision again, flashing white in the interior blackness. But beyond a few feet of sand floor and black lava walls, he saw nothing. The opening in the elephant head led into a narrow gallery, a hallway into the mountain.
A blast of hot, sulfur-tainted air swirled out of the opening. It made his eyes smart. Coincidentally, his ears were assailed by strange sound. It came out of the black hole, and it was like the wailing of souls in torment. It was a dolorous whistling that increased to a shrill screeching, then died away sobbingly.
Martin listened to that weird grief all a-prickle with shivery sensations. It was unnerving.
Nor were his companions indifferent to the sound. The four sailors huddled quickly together and gazed fearfully into the dark opening.
Moto chopped off short the word he was saying, and Martin saw his body stiffen and his eyes dilate. Even Ichi betrayed agitation, and Martin saw a violent but quickly mastered emotion flit across his yellow features.
The eery wail died quite away, and Martin's scalp stopped crawling. Ichi turned to him with a somewhat shaken smile; Martin saw that the Japanese gentleman's nostrils were twitching nervously, and that his voluble speech was really an effort to regain composure.
"Have no afraid. The sound of much strangeness is from the cave of the wind," said Ichi. "It is from the deep place. Now will come the shake, perhaps."
The shake came on the tail of Ichi's words. A heavy, ominous rumbling came out of the black depths. Martin recalled hearing the same sound the day before, when he was on the topgallant-yard. And suddenly the hard, packed sand began to crawl beneath his feet, things swayed dizzily before his eyes, and a sharp nausea attacked the pit of his stomach.
It was but a baby temblor, and it lasted but an instant.