amidst the terrors of
childhood nights, have I suffered such a sensation of extreme horror as
I did that moment in which I realized that I must lie bound and
helpless while some horrid beast of prey crept upon me to devour me in
that utter darkness of the Bandlu pits of Caspak. I reeked with cold
sweat, and my flesh crawled--I could feel it crawl. If ever I came
nearer to abject cowardice, I do not recall the instance; and yet it
was not that I was afraid to die, for I had long since given myself up
as lost--a few days of Caspak must impress anyone with the utter
nothingness of life. The waters, the land, the air teem with it, and
always it is being devoured by some other form of life. Life is the
cheapest thing in Caspak, as it is the cheapest thing on earth and,
doubtless, the cheapest cosmic production. No, I was not afraid to
die; in fact, I prayed for death, that I might be relieved of the
frightfulness of the interval of life which remained to me--the
waiting, the awful waiting, for that fearsome beast to reach me and to
strike.

Presently it was so close that I could hear its breathing, and then it
touched me and leaped quickly back as though it had come upon me
unexpectedly. For long moments no sound broke the sepulchral silence
of the cave. Then I heard a movement on the part of the creature near
me, and again it touched me, and I felt something like a hairless hand
pass over my face and down until it touched the collar of my flannel
shirt. And then, subdued, but filled with pent emotion, a voice cried:
"Tom!"

I think I nearly fainted, so great was the reaction. "Ajor!" I
managed to say. "Ajor, my girl, can it be you?"

"Oh, Tom!" she cried again in a trembly little voice and flung herself
upon me, sobbing softly. I had not known that Ajor could cry.

As she cut away my bonds, she told me that from the entrance to our
cave she had seen the Band-lu coming out of the forest with me, and she
had followed until they took me into the cave, which she had seen was
upon the opposite side of the cliff in which ours was located; and
then, knowing that she could do nothing for me until after the Band-lu
slept, she had hastened to return to our cave. With difficulty she had
reached it, after having been stalked by a cave-lion and almost seized.
I trembled at the risk she had run.

It had been her intention to wait until after midnight, when most of
the carnivora would have made their kills, and then at