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Whenever it was a question of going to left or right, Doc looked at the juncture of floor and wall. Cobbs had carefully made tiny markings with a pen the first time he had come here. These indicated their previous route so that they would be able to find their way out.
They went up steps cut out of stone to upper levels four times before Cobbs finally called a halt.
"We're getting close to the place where the dwarf captured us.
They were standing in a round chamber about forty feet across. It contained a dozen large boxes of oak on which were carved hunting and battle scenes. The costumes of the dwarfs and the humans in the scenes were those worn circa 800-900 A.D.
"They look like coffins," Pauncho said to the woman.
"They are coffins," she said.
She tried to raise a lid but could not manage it. "It's so heavy," she said. "But you should see the mummified body and the jewelry and gold it's decorated with.'
"Here, let me help you!" Barney and Pauncho said. They collided with each other in their eagerness to get to the coffin.
"Leave it alone! ' Doc said. "They might be booby-trapped now! " But Pauncho, gri
At the same time, the lids of the other coffins screeched upward, and other figures sat up aiming automatic pistols at them.
A voice behind them said, "Freeze! " A voice ahead of them said, "Not a move!"
"A beauty of a trap!" Pauncho whispered. He looked at Doc Caliban. The huge man was obeying instructions. He had no choice. The fire from three sides would have cut them all down within a few seconds.
Ten minutes later, their hands cuffed behind them, they went up stone steps onto another level. The twenty men who accompanied them kept pistols pressed against their backs. They marched down a long tu
Doc Caliban remembered, however, that Iwaldi had been born long before portrait painting of this sort was known. These dwarfs must be men who had inhabited this underground fortress; perhaps they were Iwaldi's descendants, not his grandsires.
Except for the paintings, the tu
They were marched into a square chamber and here all the prisoners were forced to undress. The inspection that followed was thorough and included probing for concealed objects. Doc's wig and facial pseudoskin was pulled off. Two false teeth containing explosives and a coil of very thin wire were removed from his mouth.
Barbara Villiers said nothing. She was as dignified as if she were wearing a formal at the opera. Out of regard for her, Barney and Pauncho repressed the ribald comments they would have made at each other's expense.
They were marched into a chamber about fifty feet square. Stone steps cut into the sides of the walls led up to three levels of runways carved out of the rock. A man led the way up on to the second level. Just past the nearest of many entrances was a room divided by two sections of thick iron bars. The man opened a door set in the first by inserting a thin metal rod into a hole and pressing a button on the rod. The door swung back, and the party was marched up to the next section of iron bars. This was opened in the same ma
"I wonder why they separated us?" Pauncho said.
Doc did not answer.
Days passed. At least, it seemed that many days passed. They had no way of determining time except by the number of meals, and they got so hungry in between these that they were sure many were being skipped. They exercised and slept and talked much, though when they did not want to be understood they talked in the language of the People of the Blue.
The only person they saw was the man who brought their meals, and he never said a word.
Then, three or four or five days after they were captured, two men entered the outside cage.
Both were walking backward and holding a box with a short ante
This was a huge grizzly, the North American Ursus horribilis. Its head swung low, and its eyes were a bright red. Its open mouth dripped saliva.
The man with the box in front backed up to the wall, keeping his ante
The great head was only three feet from the prisoners, who could see the tiny hemisphere on top of it.
The two men got out of the cell quickly and closed the door with a loud clang. The grizzly quivered at the sound but continued sleeping.
One of the men holding a box pointed it at the beast, and, suddenly, the ponderous animal was on its feet and roaring. It reared upon its hind legs and advanced toward the prisoners as if it intended to go through the bars to get them. The man pressed another button, and the beast dropped to all fours. It no longer seemed angry; it was just curious as it prowled around the cell, sniffing here and there and stopping for some time to gaze at the prisoners.
Barney said, "Do you think Iwaldi intends to let that bear loose on us?"
Doc Caliban called loudly, "Mr. Cobbs! Miss Villiers! Can you hear me!"
Cobbs' voice was faint but distinct. "Yeah, I can hear you! "
"Just testing!" Doc Caliban said. "Can you see anything of note?"
"Just some of Iwaldi's men! Nothing of Iwaldi! "
A moment later, "Correction! Here comes Iwaldi!"
Doc Caliban looked through the double set of bars but did not see the old dwarf appear as he had expected. About ten minutes afterward, the long-bearded hunched figure appeared from the. right. Evidently, he had come up steps to the, right instead of taking the closer steps to the left.
The grizzly roared on seeing him and pressed against the bars as if it were trying to get its muzzle through and bite him.
Two boxes with ante
Iwaldi rolled forward like a sailor, his body hunched forward and his arms swinging at his sides. His long white hair fell to his shoulders and his white beard swung like bleached Spanish moss in a wind. The wrinkled face came close to the bars but not so close that Doc Caliban could reach through and grab him.
Iwaldi stood for two minutes staring at them while his thin lips slowly opened into a wide smile. The eyes were as red as the grizzly's.
Finally, the thin and cracked voice spoke.
"You'll not get out of this, Doctor Caliban!"
"And why not, ancient fossil?" Caliban replied evenly.
Iwaldi cackled. "Do you think that you, a baby, a born-just-yesterday, could anger me with your puerile words? So I'm a fossil? Well in a way, you're right, since fossils endure while flesh dies. And you'll die, Caliban, and soon! "Very soon!"