"She blows!"
O'Brien dropped his eyes to the Black Rock.
From the Hole a thin wreath of sea-smoke rose, and, bent sharply by the gale, almost touched the cliff. A booming, hollow sound, like the flapping of distant thunder among hills, weighed on the air, and then came a shrill, loud hiss, as of falling water, and again the wind was drenched in sea-smoke.
Phelan stretched out his hands towards the Hole, and shouted--
"Look!"
The word was scarcely uttered when the ground shook, and from that Hole a solid column of water sprang aloft with a shriek that drowned the raging of the storm. It rose fifty feet into the air, turned inward towards the cliff, and then toppled and fell with a mighty crash that again made the gigantic bases of the immemorial cliffs tremble to their lowest depths.
The monster had broken loose!
O'Brien started back. He had from childhood heard of the awful Puffing Hole, but had never seen it in action before. His first feeling was that this could be no display of ordinary power, but that the cliffs and rocks were riven by some Titanic force never exercised before. He felt certain that when again he looked down he should see the Black Rock shattered, disintegrated, annihilated. What could withstand such a blow?
The boatman drew him towards the edge of the cliff once more. He was scarcely in position when the huge shaft of water sprang once more into the air, this time to twice its former height. He was appalled, and again sprang back. The gale caught the capital of the column and lifted it bodily, dashing it against the cliff. O'Brien was covered from head to foot with water.
The two men shifted their position, so as to get out of the reach of the water, and then stood mutely looking at the terrible phenomenon.