th; for, presently, I knew that the people of the Lesser
Pyramid were threatened by the monsters that beset them; and later I had
knowledge from faint, far words whispered in my brain, that there had
been a fight with an outside Force that had harmed many in their minds;
so that in madness they had opened the gate and had run from the Lesser
Pyramid, out into the darkness of the Lands about them; and there had
their physical bodies fallen to the monsters of those Lands; but of
their souls who may know?

And this, we set assuredly to the failure of the Earth-Current, which
had robbed them of all force and power; so that, in those few weeks all
life and joy of living had left them; and neither hunger nor thirst had
they, much, nor any great desire to live; but yet a new and mighty fear
of death. And this doth seem very strange.

And, as may be thought, all this made the Peoples of the Great Redoubt
think newly of the Earth-Current that issued from the "Crack" beneath
the Pyramid; and of their latter end; so that much was writ in the
Hour-Slips concerning this matter; yet in the main to assure us that we
ourselves might each be free from a disturbed heart; though some went
foolishly to the other event, and spoke of a speedy danger to us,
likewise; as is ever the way. But the truth of our own case lay, maybe,
somewhere between.

And all the Hour-Slips were full also of imaginings of the terror of
those poor humans out in the darkness of the world, facing that end
which must come upon all, even upon our mighty Pyramid; though, as most
would believe, so far away in some future eternity, that we have no
cause to trouble.

And there were sad poems writ to the peoples of that Lesser Redoubt, and
foolish plans set about to rescue them; but none to put them to effect;
and no way by which so great a thing might be done; and doth but show
how loosely people will speak out of an over-security. Yet to me, there
had come a certain knowledge that I must make the adventure, though I
achieved naught save mine own end. Yet, it were better to cease quickly,
than that I should feel, as now I did feel.

That same night, in the Eighteenth Hour, there was a great disturbance
in the aether about the Mighty Pyramid; and I was awakened suddenly by
the Master Monstruwacan; that I might use my gift of the Night-Hearing
to hearken for the throbbing of the Master-Word, which they had thought
to come vaguely through the Instruments; but no one of