She observed him dubiously, said, "Listen Nemi, if you can get in and
out as you please, let's not loiter."
He grinned, led her to the secret entrance, pushed back the panel.
"Oh!" said Joan. "You almost had me believing that Nemi stuff."
"Come on." He squeezed through the exit, disappeared.
Joan hesitated, peering with alarm into the black hole. "The way I have
to trust you!"
Jaro reached out a hand, pulled her through, pushed the panel in place.
They were immediately in darkness so thick, so dense that they could
feel it.
"Where are you?" said Joan, a panicky note in her voice.
"Here," Jaro laughed.
"Oh!" she ejaculated. "Really, Mr. Moynahan."
"What happened back in the grog shop?"
Joan hesitated, said, "It's all kind of foggy. I was simply petrified
with fright. When the lights went out, someone grabbed me. I tried to
cry out for you only someone had his hand over my mouth. I couldn't do
anything but gurgle. They dragged me toward the back of the shop. I
thought.... Well, never mind what I thought."
Jaro chuckled.
"It wasn't funny," said Joan, indignantly. "They hauled me down some
stairs, into an alley. I saw then that they were Mercurians, and I
wasn't so scared. They brought me here, and here I've been ever since.
But I still don't understand how you found me."
He said, "There seems to be a regular network of these secret passages
running through the walls. It was the merest accident that I stumbled
into them. Where they lead, though, I don't know any more than you."
"What are we going to do?" she wanted to know.
"Find Karfial Hodes. I've a hunch that he's hidden here."
"I was afraid of that," she said in a plaintive tone.
Jaro found her hand, led her to the next alcove, applied his eye to the
peep hole. The room, he saw, was identical with the one in which Joan
had been imprisoned. On the bed lay the red-headed singer of _Mercury
Sam's Garden_.
"The Red Witch," he whispered. "We're getting hot."
"Who's she?" said Joan. She pushed Jaro aside, put her eye to the peep
hole. "Where _do_ you meet these people?" she asked.