rt.

CHAPTER XXXII

HOW OTTER FOUGHT THE WATER DWELLER

Keeping himself carefully under the overshadowing edge of the rock-bank,
and holding his double-bladed knife ready in one hand, Otter swam to the
mouth of the Snake's den. As he approached it he perceived by the great
upward force of the water that the real body of the stream entered
the pool from below, the hole where the crocodile lived being but a
supplementary exit, which doubtless the river followed in times of
flood.

Otter reached the mouth of the tunnel without any great difficulty, and,
watching his chance, he lifted himself on his hands and slipped through
it quickly, for he did not desire to be seen by those who were gathered
above. Nor indeed was he seen, for his red head-dress and the goat-skin
cloak had been washed away or cast off in the pool, and in that light
his black body made little show against the black rock beneath.

Now he was inside the hole, and found himself crouching upon a bed of
sand, or rather disintegrated rock, brought down by the waters. The
gloom of the place was great, but the light of the white dawn, which had
turned to red, was gathering swiftly on the surface of the pool without
as the mist melted, and thence was reflected into the tunnel. So it
came about that very soon Otter, who had the gift, not uncommon among
savages, of seeing in anything short of absolute darkness, was able to
make out his surroundings with tolerable accuracy. The place in a corner
of which he squatted was a cave of no great height or width, hollowed in
the solid rock by the force of water, as smoothly as though it had been
hewn by the hand of man: in short, an enormous natural drain-pipe, but
constructed of stone instead of earthenware.

In the bottom of this drain trickled a stream of water nowhere more than
six inches in depth, on either side of which, for ten feet or more, lay
a thick bed of debris ground small. How far the cave stretched of course
he could not see, nor as yet could he discover the whereabouts of its
hideous occupant, though traces of its presence were plentiful, for the
sandy floor was marked with its huge footprints, and the air reeked with
an abominable stink.

"Where has this evil spirit gone to?" thought Otter; "he must be near,
and yet I can see nothing of him. Perhaps he lives further up the cave";
and he crept a pace or two forward and again peered into the gloom.

Now he perceived what had hitherto escaped him,