“Beyond those ominous portals I can discern nothing,” I murmured. “How can I be privileged to see what is there hidden?”
“Come with me,” coldly invited Blackana, “I will guide you to the nethermost realms now unseen by you. This I do not willingly, but I am thus commanded.”
Not wishing to receive my orders from the mouth of a demon, I talked to my better Friend who bade me go and be assured that _a body-guard of ten thousand would ever be at my side, though I saw them not._
On wings, swifter than the wind, Blackana and I covered the intervening space. We stood in the dark valley at one of the openings, now appearing ten-fold larger than before, and the mountains reared their imposing crests as if to an endless height.
“Follow me,” grimly spoke Blackana as he advanced through the monstrous arcade into the deepening darkness.
I remembered the ten thousand, and feared not as I followed. Downward and inward we went, with no light but a horrid glare casting its uncertain rays athwart our path.
“Is this the passage-way to Destruction?” I cried, as I saw how spectral all things were, for more than a thousand grimy faces had already added their fitful glances to the glimmering scene.
“The passage-way to Hell is not so smooth; we go to a better place,” he answered, without so much as turning his head.
We finally stopped at a line of massive elevators, ever in busy motion, carrying the throngs upward or downward.
As we paused, Blackana regarded me silently. I was then able, for the first time, to see his face clearly. No light reveals the countenance of a demon so well as the light of his own region.