He lowered his torch to the side of his rock, and its feeble flicker
fell on a chaos of rocks below. He looked long and cautiously for supple
yellow arms or tiny whip-like threads which might coil suddenly round
his legs and drag him to hideous death.
But he saw nothing of the kind. The rocks were dry and bare, not a
limpet nor a sea-weed visible, and leaving his jacket for a landmark as
before, he slowly let himself down from one huge boulder to another,
till he found himself climbing another great pile in front.
When at last his head rose above this ridge, he almost rolled over at
the sight of two huge green eyes blinking lazily at him out of the
darkness in front--two great openings far below sea-level, through which
filtered dimly the wavering green light whose refractions fluttered in
the roof.
The vast trough below him heaved gently now and then, with a ponderous
solemnity which filled him with awe. He felt himself an intruder. He
felt like a fly creeping about a sleeping tiger. He hardly dared to
breathe, lest the brooding spirit of the place should rise suddenly out
of some dark corner and squash him on his rock as one does a crawling
insect; and his anxious eyes swept to and fro for the smallest sign of
danger.
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