It was
due
to the foetid exhalations produced by this mass of noisome reptiles
congregated within a confined space far removed from the outer air.
"Faugh!" ejaculated Hoste. "Thank Heaven these awful brutes seem to
have
grown scarce again. Shall we have to go back through them, Josane?"
"It is not yet time to talk of going back," was the grim reply. Then
he
had hardly resumed his magic song before he broke it off abruptly. At
the same time the others started, and their faces blanched in the
semi-darkness.
For, out of the black gloom in front of them, not very far in front
either, there burst forth such a frightful diabolical howl as ever
curdled the heart's blood of an appalled listener.
CHAPTER FORTY FIVE.
A FEARFUL DISCOVERY.
They stood there, turned to stone. They stood there, strong men as they
were, their flesh creeping with horror. The awful sound was succeeded
by a moment of silence, then it burst forth again and again, the grim
subterraneous walls echoing back its horrible import in ear-splitting
reverberation. It sounded hardly human in its mingled intonation of
frenzied ferocity and blind despair. It might have been the shriek of a
lost soul, struggling in the grasp of fiends on the brink of the
nethermost pit.
"Advance now, cautiously, _amakosi_," said Josane. "Look where you are
stepping or you may fall far. Keep your candles ready to light. The
Home of the Serpents is a horrible place. There is no end to its
terrors. Be prepared to tread carefully."
His warning was by no means superfluous. The ground ended abruptly
across their path. Suddenly, shooting up, as it were, beneath their
very feet, pealed forth again that frightful, blood-curdling yell.
It was awful. Starting backward a pace or two, the perspiration pouring
from their foreheads, they stood and listened. On the Kafir no such
impression had the incident effected. He understood the position in all
its grim significance.
"Look down," he said, meaningly. "Look down, _amakosi_."
They did so. Before them yawned an irregular circular hole or pit,
about thirty feet deep by the same in diameter. The sides were smooth
and perpendicular; indeed, slightly overhanging from the side on which
they stood. Opposite, the glistening surface of the rock rose into a
dome. But with this hole the cavern abruptly ended, the main part of
it, that is, for a narrow cleft or "gallery" branche
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