It was as if Taven herself had called me, saying: "Come, I have
something to show you."
I put a foot on the first step, then the other foot wanted a chance to
touch the next step, and so on, each demanding its own turn in
fairness. I had gone down eight steps, counting each one, when I heard a
faint rustling noise. I stopped, my heart giving a jump, like a bird in
a cage.
There were no windows in the underground room, which was much smaller
and less regular in shape than the one above, but a faint twilight
seemed to rain down into it in streaks, like spears of rain, and I
guessed that holes had been made in the rock to give light and
ventilation. Something alive was down there, moving. I was frightened; I
hardly dared to look. And I had a nightmare feeling of being struck dumb
and motionless. I tried to turn and run up the stairs but I had to look,
and the gray filtering light struck into a pair of eyes.
CHAPTER XIV
They were great black eyes, sunken into the face of an old woman. She
stood in a corner, and it occurred to me that she had perhaps run there,
as much afraid of me as I was of her.
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