. Poor old ignorant Tom had been right, after all. Nothing good
came of such enterprises. There was a curse upon them from the
beginning. And then, as I thought of Tobias, my body shook so that I
could hardly keep on walking, and, next minute, my hatred of him so
nerved me up again that I ran on through the brush, like a madman, my
clothes clutched at by the devilish vines and torn at every yard.

I fled past the scene of our excavations, looking more haunted than ever
in the flashing gleam of the lantern. With an oath, I left them behind,
as the accursed cause of all this evil; but I cannot have gone by them
many yards when suddenly I felt the ground giving way beneath me with a
violent jerk. My arms went up in a wild effort to save myself, and then,
in a panic of fright, I felt myself shooting downward, as one might fall
down the shaft of a mine. Vainly I clutched at rocky walls as I sped
down in the earth-smelling darkness. I seemed to be falling forever, and
for a moment my head cleared and I had time to think of the crash that
was coming, at the end of my fall--a crash which, I said to myself, must
mean death. It came with sudden crunching pain, a swift tightening round
my heart, as though black ropes were being lashed tightly about it,
squeezing out my breath; then entire blackness engulfed me, and I knew
no more.

* * * * *

How long I lay there in the darkness I cannot tell. All I remember is my
suddenly opening my eyes on intense blackness, and vaguely wondering
where I was. My head felt strangely clear and alive, but for a moment I
could remember nothing. I was conscious only of a strong earthy smell,
and my eyes felt so keen that, as the phrase goes, they seemed to make
darkness visible. They seemed, too, to see themselves, as rings of light
in the blackness. My head, too, seemed entirely detached from my body,
of which, so far, I was unconscious. But, presently, the realisation of
it returned, and involuntarily I tried to move--to find, with a sort of
indifferent mild surprise, that it was impossible.

So there I lay, oddly content, in the dark--the pungent smell of the
earth my only sensation, and my head uselessly clear.

Then, bit by bit, it all came back to me, like returning circulation in
a numbed limb; but as yet dreamily, as something long ago and far away.
Then I found myself partly risen, leaning on my elbow, and looking
about--into nothingness. Then feeling seeme