Part 26 (2/2)
”Besides, she'll have the rifles and her pistols, and she kno to use the such a proposition as that?” His indignation burst all bounds
Laht,” said Ruth ”I's will hurt me--not after--not after--” Her eyes fell, her lips quivered, then she faced us steadily ”Don't ask me how I know that,” she said quietly ”Believe me, I do know it I am closer to--them than you two are And if I choose I can call upon that alien strength their ave me It is for you two that I fear”
”No fear for us,” Drake burst out hastily ”We're Norhala's little playthings We're tabu Take it froreat or small, and no matter how many, that doesn't by this time know all about us
”We'll probably be received with deuests Probably we'll find a sign--'Welcoate”
She smiled, a trifle tremulously
”We'll come back,” he said Suddenly he leaned forward, put his hands on her shoulders ”Do you think there is anything that could keepback?” he whispered
She tre deep into his
”Well,” I broke in, a bit unco
I think as Drake does, that we're tabu Barring accident there's no danger And if I guess right about these Things, accident is impossible”
”As inconceivable as the
And so we made ready Our rifles would be worse than useless, we knew; our pistols we decided to carry as Drake put it, ”for coency rations, a few instru a small spectroscope, a selection from the medical kit--all these packed in a little haversack which he threw over his broad shoulders
I pocketed lasses To retbeen out of films for his
We were ready for our journey
Our path led straight away, a sray road whose surface resembled cement packed under enormous pressure It was all of fifty feet wide and now, in daylight, glistened faintly as though overlaid with soed way that stopped at the threshold of Norhala's door
Diht as an arroard and vanished between perpendicular cliffs which forht before we had passed upon the coursing cubes from the pit of the city Here, as then, a aze
Ruth with us, we s of Norhala's house It was set as though in the narrowest portion of an hour-glass The precipitous wallsthe lower half of the figure; at the back they swung apart at a wider angle
This upper part of the hour-glass was filled with a park-like forest It was closed, perhaps twenty miles away, by a barrier of cliffs
Hoondered, did the path which Yuruk had pointed out to me pierce them? Was it by pass or tunnel; and as it the armored men had not found and followed it?
The waist between these two es was a valley not more than a mile wide Norhala's house stood in its center; and it was like a garden, dotted with flowering and fragrant lilies and here and there a tiny greenseee froh its basic curvatures were hidden in the earth
What was its substance I could not tell It was as though built of the lacquer of the gems whose colors it held And beautiful, wondrously, incredibly beautiful it was--an immense bubble of froth of molten sapphires and turquoises
We had not time to study its beauties A few last instructions to Ruth, and we set forth down the gray road Hardly had we taken a few steps when there came a faint cry fro to her, caught her hands in his For a htened it seemed, she considered him
”dick,” I heard her whisper ”dick--come back safe to me!”