Oliver was too much startled for a few moments to move or speak. Then
making an effort to master his dread, "It's an Irish echo," he said.
"Poor Wriggs, he is making his way towards me. Ahoy! this way."
"Comin' sir," came plainly enough now, but directly after every echo
seemed again blurred and confused like a picture reflected in agitated
water. But the sound was certainly very near, and each shout and answer
came closer, till at last the man's steps were plainly heard in a slow
shuffling fashion, as he evidently carefully extended one foot and then
drew the other up to join it.
"Where are you?" cried Oliver at last, for the steps were now very
close, and his voice, like the man's, sounded strange and confused by
the repetitions from roof, wall, and water.
"Clost here!"
"Hold out your hand," cried Oliver, as he extended his own. "Ha!
That's good," he said, with his heart leaping for joy at the warm strong
grasp he received. "Thank Heaven you are safe!"
"Thank-ye, Mr Oliver Lane, sir. But my word it are black, Hold of a
coalin' screw's nothing to it."
"Where were you?" said Oliver, as he clung to the man's hand.
"Oh, clost along here by the waterside, sir."
"But did you fall in? No; you are not wet."
"Oh, no, sir, I never fell. I'm dry enough."
"Then how came you to hang behind, and cause all this trouble and
alarm?"
"'Cause company's good, they says, if you're going to be hanged; and as
you wasn't, sir, I 'adn't the 'art to let you stop all alone here in the
dark."
"Why, it isn't Wriggs, then?"
"Nay, sir, that's for sartin, I on'y wish as how it was."
"Why, Smith, my good fellow! Then you stopped back to keep me company?"
"That's so, sir, and I thought it would be best. You see it'll be bad
enough for two on us to wait, but for one all alone in a coal-cellar
like this, it's too horful I says to myself, and so I just hung back,
and here I am, sir."
"Oh, Smith, my good fellow!" cried Oliver, who felt moved at the man's
act.
"It's all right, sir. You and me can talk about birds as you've
skinned, and about some o' those tomtit and sparrer things as I've seen
about, and meant to shoot for yer some day. And when we're tired o'
that, we can ask riddles and sing a song or two, or play at chucking one
stone at another, or into the water. It won't be so much like being all
alone in the coal-cellar, shut up for a naughty boy as I used to be when
I was a little 'un."
"Smith, I can never feel grateful enough for this," cried Oliver.
"Gammon, sir; Pretty sort of a chap I should be if I hadn't ha' been
ready to stop and keep a gent like you comp'ny a bit. Don't you say no
more about that there, sir."
"I must, Smith, I must," said Oliver, huskily.
"Then I shall be off till you've done, sir; and you'll have to say it to
the heckers as allus answers, `Where'?"
Oliver pressed the man's hand, and Smith gave a sigh of relief.
"Any use to offer you a bit o' good pig-tail, sir?" he said. "Werry
comfortin' at a time like this."
"No, thank you, Smith, I don't chew."
"I doos," said Smith, giving a grunt or two, which was followed by the
click of the knife being shut after using it to cut a quid, and then by
the sharp snap of a brass tobacco box. "Werry bad habit, sir, but I
don't seem able to leave it off. I say, sir, what about poor old Billy?
Don't say as you think he's drowned."
"No, no, I hope and pray not," said Oliver.
"That's right, sir. I don't believe he is. Stoopid chuckle brain sort
o' chap in some things; and talk about a bull being obstinit, why, it
would take a hundred bulls biled down to produce enough obst'nacy to
make one Billy Wriggs. He wouldn't get drowned; I've known him tumble
out o' the rigging over and over, and be upset out of a boat, but he's
only picked his self up and clambered in again, and been hauled into the
boat when he was upset. While one day when he were washed overboard--
and I thought he had gone that time, for you couldn't ha' lowered a boat
in such a sea--I'm blessed if another big wave didn't come and wash him
back again, landing him over the poop so wet as you might ha' wrung him
out wonderful clean, and if he'd only had a week's beard off, he'd ha'
looked quite the gentleman."
"Poor fellow, we must save him somehow."
"Tchah! Don't you be down-hearted, sir, you see if he don't turn up all
right again. Reg'lar bad shillin' Billy is. Why, you see how he went
on when he went up the mountain and into holes and over 'em and into hot
water. He allus comes out square. He can't help it. No savage
couldn't kill Billy no matter what he did, and as for this here game--
oh, he'll be all right."
"I hope so, Smith," said Oliver, with a sigh.
"Well, sir, it don't sound as if yer did. You spoke in a tone o' woice
as seemed to say I hope he's jolly well drowned."
"I can't help feeling low-spirited, Smith."
"Course you can't, sir, but you just cheer up and I'll try and tell you
a yarn o' some kind."
"No, no: not now."
"But I feel as if I'd like to, sir, a reg'lar good out an' outer--a
stiff 'un, cause just when I got to the biggest whopper in it, I should
expect to hear Billy behind my back in that solemn and serus woice of
his a-saying, `Speak the truth, Tommy, speak the truth.'"
"If I could think that, Smith, I'd say go on, but I cannot. Here, let's
talk about him and his accident."
"I don't think there's been no accident, sir, yer see he aren't a
haccidental sort o' chap."
"Well, about his disappearance."
"Disappearance, sir?" said Smith. "I aren't no scholard, but I don't
see as how a man can disappear in the dark. That aren't nat'ral, is
it?"
"No: of course not, a blunder of mine, Smith. Do you feel cold?"
"No, sir, on'y just comf'able. Watcher think o' doing?"
"I did mean to go right to where we stood looking down over the water
toward the falls, so as to be near poor Wriggs, but our voices would be
quite drowned."
"Might take a walk there, sir, all the same," said Smith, "an' then come
back, you know. But I say, sir, you don't think there's no underground
sort o' wild beasties here, do you?"
"No, Smith, nothing of the kind."
"No big sort of worms as might twissen round yer and pull yer into their
holes?"
"No, Smith, I think we shall have the place all to ourselves."
"And no t'other sort o' things, sir?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, sir, I don't quite azakly know, but it comes natral like to be
feared o' being in the dark, and one has heard o' bogies and ghosties
and that sort o' thing."
"Did you ever see anything of the kind?"
"Well, no, sir, I never did, but I've heerd chaps say as they've seen
some rum things in their time from sea sarpents downwards."
"As to sea-serpents or some kind of monstrous creature similar to the
old saurians--"
"Sawrians, sir,--do you mean sea sawrians?"
"Sea and river; the crocodiles whose remains we find as fossils. There
is plenty of room in the sea, Smith, and, as a naturalist, I am quite
ready to believe in something fresh being discovered. We have seen
small sea-serpents, and there is no reason why there might not be big
ones, but as to what you call bogies and ghosts, for goodness sake throw
over all those silly superstitious notions."
"What, don't you believe people ever comes back arter they're dead?"
"On purpose to frighten the living? No, Smith, I do not. It is an
insult to the greatness of nature and the whole scheme of creation."
"Well, sir, speakin' as a man as couldn't help feelin' a bit
uncomfortable here in the dark with on'y one looficer in his pocket, it
does me good to hear you say that, though it is a bit higher up than I
can quite reach with my head. You've made me feel a deal better, for it
aren't nice to think as there's anything o' that sort to upset you when
the place is quite bad enough without."
"Of course it is," said Oliver. "Come on now. Shall I lead, or will
you?"
"You, please sir, and what do you say to keepin' hold o' hands?"
"I was going to propose it. Here's mine."
Smith grasped the extended hand, and Oliver started off at once, making
his way cautiously to the edge of the river, and then, as a boy might
along the kerbstone of a street, he kept on passing his right foot
along, till at last they stood in the profound darkness, listening to
the thundering echoing roar of the falling water reverberating from the
hollow roof and rising and sinking in booming deep diapasons till there
were moments when it seemed to their stunned ears like a burst of
strange wild giant music.
They stood for long enough together there, feeling that they were quite
at the edge where the water-worn lava formed an angle, thinking, with
many a shudder, that if poor Wriggs had fallen from where they stood,
they could never by any possibility see him again.
At last Oliver drew his companion back, and, placing his lips to the
man's ear, shouted to him that it was of no use to stay there, and they
had better return to the portion of the cavern round the angle where
they could speak to each other.
"You be leader going back," said Oliver.
"But I aren't sure which way to go, sir," shouted back Smith.
Oliver placed his lips close again.
"Keep your left foot on the edge and slide it along as we go."
"But suppose it's wrong way, sir?" suggested Smith.
"It can't be," cried Oliver again. "If you keep your left foot on the
edge of the rock, every step must take us back toward the entrance."
Smith tightened his grasp and began, but so clumsily, that at the end of
ten minutes he slipped, fell, and gave so violent a jerk to Oliver's arm
that the latter nearly lost his hold, and, for a few moments, the
sailor's fate seemed sealed. For he lay motionless with both legs over
the edge, while all Oliver could do was to hold on, with his heart
beating heavily, and the roar of the cavern seeming to be multiplied a
hundredfold. He could not shout, for his throat felt dry, but he knew
that if he did, his voice would not be heard, and he waited till Smith
recovered himself a little, then made a struggle, and managed with his
companion's help to get on his legs again.
Then the slow movement was resumed, with Oliver conscious of the
exertion and shock by the twitching, beating sensation of the pulses in
the sailor's hand.
At last, after what seemed to be an endless length of time the sudden
silence which fell upon them told them that they were somewhere about
their resting-place, and drawing back from the edge of the little river,
Smith sank down upon the lava with a groan.
"Oh, murder in Irish!" he said. "I thought I was gone, sir. I was
feeling along with my left hoof, when my right suddenly give a slip on a
bit of rock as seemed like glass, and there it was slithering away more
and more. If you hadn't ha' held on, you might ha' told 'em to sell off
my kit by auction when you got back."
"I thought you were gone too, Smith," said Oliver, with a shudder.
"Yes, sir, it was werry 'orrid; and do you know, I fancy that's where
poor old Billy slipped and went down."
"Possibly," said Oliver, and seating himself they talked at intervals
for hours in the tomb-like silence of the awful place, till a peculiar
drowsy feeling stole over Oliver, and he started back into wakefulness
with a shudder of horror, for it suddenly struck him that he was
beginning to be influenced by some mephitic gas once more, such as had
affected them along the line of the mist at the foot of the mountain.
"Smith!" he cried excitedly, "do you feel sleepy?"
A low deep breathing was the only reply.
"Smith! wake up!" he cried; but there was a want of energy in his words,
and five minutes after his efforts had grown feeble in the extreme. In
another, he too had succumbed, not to a dangerous soporific vapour, but
to the weariness produced by long exertion, and slept as soundly as his
companion, and as if there was nothing whatever to fear.