"Not in the least," returned the dwarf. "This is the first time I've been here—and it shall be the last, if I'm allowed any choice in the matter."
"You haven't told me how you came here at all," observed Thorneycroft.
"I hardly know myself," replied the dwarf; "but I find it more difficult to get out than I did to get in. How this passage twists about! I declare we seem to be returning to the point we started from."
"I think we are turning round ourselves," cried Thorneycroft, in an agony of fright. "My head is going. Oh dear! oh dear!"
"Why, it does seem very strange, I must say," remarked the dwarf, coming to a halt. "I could almost fancy that the solid stone walls were moving around us."
"They are moving," cried Thorneycroft, stretching out his hand. "I feel 'em. Lord have mercy upon us, and deliver us from the power of the Evil One!"
"The place seems on fire," cried the dwarf. "A thick smoke fills the passage. Don't you perceive it, Mr. Thorneycroft?"
"Don't I!—to be sure I do," cried the iron-merchant, coughing and sneezing. "I feel as if I were in a room with a smoky chimney, and no window open. Oh!—oh!—I'm choking!"
"Don't mind it," cried the dwarf, who seemed quite at his ease. "We shall soon be out of the smoke."
"I can't stand it," cried Mr. Thorneycroft; "I shall die. Oh! poah—pish—puff!"