"Loathsome, greasy reptiles were under our feet, the clammy rocks seemed to be alive with them. Yet they did us no harm; indeed, their sole object seemed to be to get out of our way. Sometimes great eyes gleamed at us, but those eyes were ever filled with a terror greater than our own.
"After a bit this sense of fear passed away. Had we been alone, had we possessed no hope of ultimate salvation, the unseen horrors of the place would have driven us mad. We should have wandered on until we had dropped hopelessly insane and perished. Even a man utterly devoid of imagination could not have fought off the mad terror of it all. As for me, I will never forget it."
Tchigorsky paused and wiped his forehead. Glancing at Ralph, Geoffrey could see that the latter was trembling like a leaf.
"We came to the end of it at length," Tchigorsky went on. "We came to light and a long desolate valley whence we proceeded into an arid desert. Here we found our latitude and dismissed our guides. We ought to have shot them, but we refrained. It would have saved a deal of trouble. They were not less dangerous than mad dogs.
"We got into communication with our guides and servants in a day or two, and there ended the first and most thrilling volume of our adventures. How the Princess Zara has persecuted us ever since you know. And how we are going to turn the tables on that fiend of a woman you also know."
There was a long silence after Tchigorsky had finished and dusk began to fall. Geoffrey looked out of the window toward the sea. Suddenly he started.
"Blobber Rock," he gasped. "Covered! Not a vestige of it to be seen! It is high spring tide to-day, the highest of the month, and I had forgotten all about it."
"What difference does it make?" Tchigorsky asked.
"It fills the underground caves," Geoffrey cried. "We have locked the doors of the lower vault, and in that vault are the two Asiatics waiting the orders of their mistress. A spring tide fills that vault with water. If those men got that letter, as they are pretty sure to have done by this time, then they are dead men. Once they get into the cave the tide would cut them off, and they would be drowned like rats in a sewer. Of course, they would have no idea the vault was closed to them, and----"