with a candle and a box of matches in
his other pocket. Then turning on his electric torch, he lowered himself
cautiously into the pit by the creepers which fringed the surface.

There was no difficulty about the descent for the first eight or ten
feet. Then the shrubs that had afforded foothold for his feet suddenly
ceased, and the foot that he had thrust down for another perch touched
nothing but the slippery side of the pit. Clinging firmly with his left
hand to the network of vegetation which grew above his head, Colwyn
flashed his electric torch into the blackness of the pit beneath him.
One or two long tendrils of the climbing plants which grew higher up
dangled like pendulous snakes, but the vegetable growth ceased at that
point. Beneath him the naked sides of the pit gleamed sleek and wet in
the rays of the torch.

Pulling himself up a little way to gain a securer footing, Colwyn took
the coil of rope from his pocket, and selecting a strong withe which
hung near him, sought to fasten the end of the rope to it. It took him
some time to do this with the hand he had at liberty, but at length he
accomplished it to his satisfaction, and then he allowed the coils of
the rope to fall into the pit. He next essayed to test the strength of
the support, by pulling at it. To his disappointment, his first vigorous
tug snapped the withe to which the rope was attached. He tied the rope
to a stronger growth, but with no better result: the growths seemed
brittle, and incapable of bearing a great strain when tested separately.
It was the twisted network of the withes and twigs which gave the
climbing plants inside the pit sufficient toughness to support his
weight. Taken singly, they had very little strength.

Colwyn reluctantly realised that it would be folly to endeavour to
attempt the further descent of the pit by their frail support, and he
decided to relinquish the attempt.

As he was about to ascend, the light of the torch brought into view that
part of the pit to which he was clinging, and he noticed that the
testing of the withes had torn away a portion of the leafy screen,
revealing the black and slimy surface of the pit's side. Colwyn was
amazed to see a small peg, with a fishing line attached to it, sticking
in the bare earth thus exposed. Somebody had been down the pit and
placed it there--recently, judging by the appearance of the peg, which
was clean and newly cut. What was at the other end of the line, which
da