They went up the wide, steep passage. They came to the narrow, twisty little tunnel they had been in before and walked along till they came to the fork.
“Left-hand fork,” said Jack, and they took that. Bill was amazed to see the beautiful silken hangings that decorated the walls further on, and hung across the entrance to a cave.
Jack put his hand on Bill’s arm. “That’s the king’s bedroom, beyond,” he whispered. “Dinah, have you got Snowy? Don’t let him rush on in front.”
Bill tiptoed to the curtains and parted them. A dim light shone beyond. Bill looked with interest into the king’s bedroom — and then closed the curtains quickly. He tiptoed back to the children.
“There’s somebody lying on the couch there,” he whispered. “An old fellow with a colossal forehead.”
“That’s the king of the mountain!” whispered back Jack. “The Great Brain behind all these inventions. I think he is an absolute genius, but quite mad.”
“He seems to be asleep,” said Bill. “Is there any way we can go round this cave without waking him up?”
“No. I don’t know of any,” said Jack. “We’ve got to go through it, and then through a cave where he eats his meals, and then into the throne-room.”
Bill thought for a moment. “We’ll have to risk it then,” he said. “We’ll go through the room one by one but for heaven’s sake don’t make a sound!”
They went through the king’s bedroom one at a time, hardly daring to breathe. Dinah had tight hold of Snowy, praying that he wouldn’t bleat when he went through the room!
Fortunately there were very thick carpets on the floor, so it was easy to make no sound. Lucy-Ann’s heart beat so loudly as she tiptoed across that she thought it must surely wake the king with a jump.
Then they were in the room where the long table had held so much lovely food. But now it was empty and there was not so much as a dish of fruit on it.
Then on to the throne-room — and outside this, behind the lovely hangings patterned with the red dragons, the little company paused. A curious noise came to their ears — was it snoring? What was it?
Bill peeped through the hangings very cautiously. He grinned. In the throne-room, sitting or lying, were the paratroopers. A very long table had been set down the middle, and on it were the remains of a lavish supply of food and drink. Not a single man was awake!
“So that’s where those fellows have been the last day or two!” whispered Jack. “I wondered where they were. Gosh, they’ve fallen asleep where they are — what a pretty sight!”
Bill fumbled about in the hangings they were looking through. He was looking for a switch. He found one and whispered to the children. “Now listen — I’m going to switch off the light so that we can get through the hall without being seen. Keep close to one side of it and get through as quietly as possible. Even if we do make a noise and some of those fellows wake up it won’t matter — because they won’t be able to see who it is!”
This was a good idea. The light went out with a slight click and the great hall was in darkness. The children, led by Bill, moved quietly along one side, their feet making no noise on the soft mats.
When they came to the immense laboratory Bill stood still in amazement. He knew a great deal more about these things than the children did, of course, and he could see what a brilliant, ingenious mind must be at the back of all the things at work there.
They stood in the gallery and looked down at the wires and wheels, the glass jars and the crystal boxes, and heard the quiet, purposeful humming going on.
“What is it all doing, Bill?” whispered Lucy-Ann.
“It’s transmuting, or changing, one power or energy into another,” said Bill soberly. “Making it into usable form, so that . . .”
“So that it can be imprisoned in those ‘wings,’ for instance?” said Jack.
“Something like that,” said Bill. “It’s an amazing setup altogether.”
There was nobody there. It did seem extraordinary that all these humming, spinning, whirring things should go on and on seemingly of their own accord, with just the king wandering round them occasionally.
Bill was so fascinated that for a few moments he forgot the urgency of finding the way out of the mountain. There was something dream-like about all this — it didn’t seem real.
He was brought back to reality again by feeling Snowy butting against him. He jumped a little. Then he took Lucy-Ann’s arm. “Come along! What am I thinking of, stopping like this!”
Jack had found the passage that led out of the laboratory. He led them down it and they came to the great cave they had seen before. Bill’s torch swept round it but there was nothing to see. Then they went into the passage that led to the roofless cave! The children felt they really were getting near freedom again — if only, only, only they could find out how to get that rope-ladder out of its place in the wall!
They passed the dim lamps, which, for some reason or other, were lighted here. They came to the roofless cave, and Bill’s torch picked out the pitchers of ice-cold water standing at the back to refresh those who had had the long and exhausting climb up the rope-ladder.
“This is the place where the ladder’s kept,” said Jack, and he took Bill’s torch and swung it to find the place in the rocky wall where they had seen it last.
But before he could spot it, Lucy-Ann tripped over something and fell with a thud. Bill picked her up. She had hurt her knees but she didn’t make a sound. Bill told Jack to flash his torch on Lucy-Ann to see what she had fallen over.
She had stumbled over the rope-ladder itself! There it lay, stretching from its place in the wall, over the floor and then disappearing downwards over the edge of the cave — down, down, down to the cave with the pool far below!
“Look! The ladder’s out!” cried Jack, forgetting to whisper in his excitement. “Oh, Bill — let’s come on down at once!”
“Somebody must have gone out of the mountain tonight,” said Dinah, “and left the ladder down to come back by. I wonder who it was. We’d better be careful we don’t meet them!”
“Jack, you go down first,” said Bill, who had been examining with great interest the way the ladder was attached to the hole in the wall. It was extremely ingenious. Bill could see how wires must be run up from the wheel in the pool to a lever which released the ladder — whose weight then compelled it to run out over the floor to the edge of the cave, where it fell and then rolled itself undone until it had come to its last rung. What made it able to roll itself up again Bill could not imagine — but the brain that could devise all the amazing things inside that mountain would find that a very simple problem!
Jack went to the place where the ladder hung over the edge. He knelt down and put his feet one after another on a rung a little way down. The ladder felt as firm as before. It was very well made and strong.
“Well, here I go,” said Jack. “Send the girls next, Bill, and then you come. Snowy’s gone already, down whatever little hole he and the dogs use! I don’t know where that is. I only wish I knew where poor old Kiki was. I don’t like leaving her all alone in this beastly mountain.”
Bill shone his torch on him. The girls watched his head disappear as he climbed down.
“You go now, Lucy-Ann,” said Bill. “Jack must be a good way down. You won’t tread on his head. Then Dinah can go, and I’ll follow last of all. Don’t attempt to leave the cave below till I am down with you.”
Jack was going steadily down. What a long long way it was! And then a very peculiar thing happened. The ladder began to shake below him! Jack stopped climbing at once.
“Gracious! Somebody’s climbing up! And I’m climbing down! Whoever can it be!”
Chapter 27
ESCAPE AT LAST
NO sooner had he felt certain that somebody was climbing up very steadily below him than Jack immediately stopped climbing down and began climbing back again at top speed. He didn’t want to meet Meier or Erlick on that ladder.
Some way up he bumped into Lucy-Ann’s feet. She gave a small squeal of fright. “It’s all right, Lucy-Ann. It’s only me,” said Jack in a low voice. “There’s somebody coming up the ladder. Go back again as quickly as you can!”