sought our former resting-place,
recognizing it by the platter and basin which we had emptied before our
famous and daring attempt to escape.

Soon Harry began:

"I'll tell you what they are, Paul; they're frogs. Nothing but frogs.
Did you see 'em? The little black devils! And Lord, how they smell!"

"That," I answered, "is the effect of--"

"To the deuce with your mineralogy or anthromorphism or whatever you
call it. I don't care what makes 'em smell. I only know they do--as
Kipling says of the oonts--'most awful vile.' And there the beggars
sit, and here we sit!"

"If we could only see--" I began.

"And what good would that do us? Could we fight? No. They'd smother
us in a minute. Say, wasn't there a king in that cave the other day?"

"Yes; on a golden throne. An ugly little devil--the ugliest of all."

"Sure; that why he's got the job. Did he say anything?"

"Not a word; merely stuck out his arm and out we went."

"Why the deuce don't they talk?"

I explained my theory at some length, with many and various scientific
digressions. Harry listened politely.

"I don't know what you mean," said he when I had finished, "but I
believe you. Anyway, it's all a stupendous joke. In the first place,
we shouldn't be here at all. And, secondly, why should they want us to
stay?"

"How should I know? Ask the king. And don't bother me; I'm going to
sleep."

"You are not. I want to talk. Now, they must want us for something.
They can't intend to eat us, because there isn't enough to go around.
And there is Desiree. What the deuce was she doing up there without
any clothes on? I say, Paul, we've got to find her."

"With pleasure. But, first, how are we going to get out of this?"

"I mean, when we get out."

Thus we rattled on, arriving nowhere. Harry's loquacity I understood;
the poor lad meant to show me that he had resolved not to "whine." Yet
his cheerfulness was but partly assumed, and it was most welcome. My
own temper was getting sadly frayed about the edge.

We slept through another watch uneventfully, and when we woke found our
platter of fish and basin of water beside us. I estimated that some
seventy-two hours had then passed since we had been carried from the
cavern; Harry said not less than a hundred.

However that may be, we had almost entirely recovered our strength.
Indeed, Harry declared himself perfectly fit; but I still felt some
discomfort, caused partly by the knife-w