Абрахам Меррит - The Face In The Abyss

Five times the luminous ball shot ahead of them, lighting their way through the unbroken tunnel. Four miles and more they must have gone since they had left the lair, and the pace was beginning to tell on Graydon. Again the faint light was dimming, but far ahead was an oval opening behind which there seemed to be a flood of moonbeams. Now they were out of the passage and through that opening. And there Graydon paused, transfixed with amazement and awe.

It was another caverned space whose walls and roof he could not see. It was filled with silvery light like the woven rays of full moons of Spring. Under that light, upon low couches, lay cushioned the bodies of score upon score of women and men, each of their faces stamped with the unearthly beauty of Yu–Atlanchi, and as though asleep. Across the cavern, and back into the mountain as far as his vision could go, they lay. At first he thought that they were sleeping; then he saw that no breath raised their breasts. Staring at silken hair, golden and black and ruddy bronze, at red lips and blossoms of fair bosoms, he thought them exquisitely tinted statues.

Touching the hair, the cheek of one close to him, he realized that they were no effigies, but bodies once instinct with life; transmuted now by some alchemy of this mysterious land not into stone but into imperishable substance retaining both the coloring of the body when it had been living flesh, and its texture.

"Yu–Atlanchi's dead!" said Regor. "The ancient ones who passed before the Gate of Death was closed. And those who since that time opened of their own will that Gate, so new life might stream among us. The dead!"

The Indians were uneasy, eager to be going. Quickly they left that silent place of the dead, and even Regor seemed to be relieved when they had passed into another passage through the rock.

"A few steps more, lad," he rumbled, "and we are out. And here the way is not beset with such dangers. We have passed under five of the great caverns, the place of the dead was the sixth; we skirt the entrances of three more and then we are at the Frog–woman's. And by every scale of the Mother—I will be glad to get once more into the open."

And shortly they passed cautiously out of that passage, and Graydon felt the fresh air upon his face, and looked up into a sky where a half–moon dipped in and out of scurrying clouds.

They dropped down upon a narrow trail. Here the Indians re–formed, part going ahead of them, the others following. At left, the verdure rose high, masking the lake. Looking upward and back, he saw the colossal figure of a woman, in pure white stone, with arms raised to the Heavens—the guardian of that cavern through which they had just passed. Then the vegetation closed round him.

The trail was easy to follow, not dark even when the clouds covered the moon. Louder, and even louder came the roar of the cataract. Through gaps in the trees and bushes, he caught glimpses of the monstrous figure of the Frog–woman, on watch at the entrance of the black oval that was the mouth of her cavern.

The path began to rise. It passed behind a high ledge and became a steep flight of narrow steps. He climbed these. He stood in the shadow close to the opening of the Frog–woman's cavern. He looked up at that colossal figure, a squatting woman, unclothed, and carved of some green stone that glistened beneath the moon as though its rays were falling spray. Her grotesque face grinned at him above the exquisite shoulders and breasts. Beside her gaped the cavern's mouth, inky black.

He was at the inner edge of an immense platform of smooth stone. Directly opposite him, a half–mile across the lake, was the secret city.

More than ever, under the moon, did it seem a city built by Djinns. It was larger, far larger, than he had thought it. Its palaces thrust up their fantastic turrets and domes; their gay colorings as of lacquer of jewels were changed and softened into a tapestry that spread for mile upon mile, an immense rug each of whose irised patterns was surrounded by arabesques of dark green, and black, and white, the foliage and flowers of the trees that circled the dwellings. From minaret and tower and dome sprang tiny arches of light, delicate moon– bows, spanning them like bridges. In the air, above the green and black, and threading them, tiny dancing lights flashed and vanished and flashed out again, fireflies, he thought, playing among the trees. At the right, looking down upon the city, was the Temple, vestal white, majestic, serene.

Somewhere within it might be—Suarra! Perhaps she would not be able to meet him here after all. With half his mind he hoped that she would not, for Huon's farewell still echoed in his heart, and he feared for her. And half his mind willed fiercely that she should come—let the perils be what they may.

There was a rustle close beside him. A little hand caught his. He looked down into soft dark eyes, a tress of cloudy hair kissed his cheek, rocking him with its fragrance.

"Suarra!" he whispered, and again—"Suarra!"

"Graydon!" her sweet voice murmured. "You did come back to me— beloved!"

Her arms were around his neck, her lips were close to his, and slowly, slowly, they drew closer. They met, and clung—and for a time there were no such things in all the world as peril or suffering, sorrow or death.

THE SHADOW of the Frog–woman, sharply outlined by the moonlight, lay in fantastic profile from side to side of the great platform. Behind them was the blackness of her cavern, and between them and the city the lake shone like a vast silver mirror, waveless, no sign of life upon it. Below the platform, the Indians watched. The Frog–woman's head seemed to bend lower, listening to their whispering.

"Graydon! Graydon!" Suarra was weeping. "You should not have returned! Oh, but it was wicked of me to call you back!"

"Nonsense!" rumbled Regor. "You love each other, don't you? Well, then, what else was there for him to do? Besides, he has made strong friends—Huon and Black Regor, and one stronger than all of us, or by Riza the Lightning Eater he wouldn't be here! I mean the Mother herself. Child," he said slyly, "has she instructed you how to take him back to her?"

"Ah, Regor," sighed Suarra, "far from it. It is what weighs so upon my heart. For when I received your message I told her straightway of it, and asked her aid, but told her also that with it or without it, still must I go. She only nodded, and said: 'Naturally—since you are woman.' Then after a little silence she spoke again: 'Go, Suarra—no harm shall come to you.' 'I ask protection for him, Mother,' I said, and she did not answer. And I asked:

"'Mother Adana, will you not summon him to you through me, so that none will dare harm him?' The Mother shook her head: 'If he loves you he will find his own way to me.'"

"No one saw you? No one followed you?" questioned Regor.

"No," said Suarra, "no, I'm quite sure they did not. We went through the Hall of the Weavers, and into the secret way that leads beneath the cataract, thence out and by the hidden path along the shore."

"You came silently? You heard nothing, saw nothing, as you passed the first cavern?"

"Very silently," she answered. "And as for the cavern, the path dips far below it, so that one can neither see it nor be seen from it. And I heard nothing—nothing but the voice of the torrent."

"Where was Lantlu?" Regor still did not seem satisfied.

"They fed the Xinli to–night!" she said, and shivered.

"Then," said Regor with satisfaction, "we know at least where he is."

"Well," Graydon spoke, "the upshot of the matter seems to be that much depends upon my doing obeisance in person to the Mother. And she has put it severely up to me to accomplish that—"