At one place a step was half broken away; at another, rock crumbled beneath my foot, and the fragments cascaded into the depths below. The steps were slabs of rock set into the wall of the well like the rungs of a winding, one-sided ladder.
My candle flame stood erect, for there was no air movement. Had the flame shrunk? Was it true that where a flame would not burn a man could not live? Somewhere I had heard this.
Suddenly, I was upon a stone platform six feet square, and I paused to rest. Sweat drenched me, and the air was close and hot. My breath came hoarsely, but I could not be sure whether it was my exertions or the foulness of the air.
Starting downward again, I suddenly found a broken step! Cautiously, I reached with a toe, feeling for it. Putting my toe upon the broken step, I slowly let it take my weight. My foot settled … suddenly the step gave way. The stone crumbled, and my foot plunged down. Wildly, I grabbed at the wall. My fingers found a crack and clung. Precariously, afraid to even breathe, I clung against the face of the inner wall, trembling in every muscle. Then the true enormity of my disaster struck me. My candle was gone!
When I grabbed at the wall, the candle had fallen, so I was marooned, clinging to a crack in the wall in abysmal darkness, unable to see or even move.
There was no light, nor could the eyes become accustomed to a darkness where there was a complete absence of light. I clung to the wall, trembling with fear, gasping hoarsely.
Slowly, my good sense returned. How long I clung there I have no idea, yet it seemed an eon of time before I dared move. One toe rested in the tiniest crack; my fingers clung to another. Below me lay that black and awful pit, and my body became slippery with the sweat of fear. If I tried to lift one foot to another resting place, the other might slip off.
Another rock fell away under me, and fell and fell, and fell. Inside me was a vast emptiness in which fear had turned my guts to water. Always I had hated being locked up, hated barred and closed places. My muscles ached, my fingers were growing numb, only the weariness in my muscles gave me a sense of passing time. Perhaps it was no more than minutes, even seconds, yet it seemed forever. Win or lose I must make an effort, for if I remained hanging there, I must surely fall, and there was no one to come to my rescue.
Somewhere below me was another step. Yet, suppose it, too, was gone? Suppose this was the purpose of the steps? To let some doomed prisoner believe in escape, to let him descend into darkness, only to plunge off into space and die miserably on the bottom?
Careful not to put too much strain on my fingerhold, I put out a tentative, exploring toe.
14
Beneath me there was nothing but space. Moving my toe carefully along the wall, I felt for a foothold. My fingers were aching, and the one leg that had a perch was trembling uncontrollably. How much longer I could cling like a fly to that sheer wall I had no idea.
Feeling along the wall with my free toe, I encountered an obstruction. It was further over and somewhat lower down. Carefully, I stretched still further, finally getting my foot upon solid rock.
An instant I held myself there, gathering strength and will, then with my right hand I reached out further, trying for a handhold. When I found it, it was the tiniest edge of a rock that had not been fitted properly. It offered only the barest fingertip hold.
Moving with extreme care, I shifted my other hand and foot and stood upon solid rock once more. But I remained in absolute darkness with nothing to strike a light.
Without a light I could not go back up the steps, and every move was made at the risk of my life, yet I had no choice but to continue. If I was gone too long, Aziza might try to find me, and the thought of her on those steps was frightening. So I must continue to the bottom, feeling my way down, hoping there would be no missing steps.
The air was close, and I found myself fighting to get enough into my lungs. There was no time to waste, for I had heard of men dying in old tunnels or long-closed spaces.
How long it took I had no idea. In the darkness there was no way of estimating time. It seemed I had been clinging to that wall forever, inching my way down, streaming with perspiration. In this dark well I had no way of knowing whether it was taking minutes, hours, or days.
Suddenly, my foot was upon earth, but when I moved I felt something break under my feet. As I squatted down, my fingers touched the smooth surface of a skull and some broken bones.
Feeling about, my hand found the skull again, touched the eyeholes. I jerked my hand away … some poor wretch like myself who attempted a way out and was left here to die.
I felt oppressed, as if something were pushing against my chest. My hands groped for the wall. There had to be a way out.
Twice more my feet crunched on what had to be broken bones, but my searching fingers on the wall found no crack, only solid, unbroken stone.
Crouching, I began a second turning of the tower base, this time feeling lower down for any crack, any break in the wall that might mean an opening. I found nothing.
The very thought of climbing up, of enduring that nightmare again was … My eyelids drooped, my muscles seemed to give way, and I sat down. My brain warned me that the foul air was killing me. Soon it would rob me of consciousness, and I would fall to the floor to die as had the others.
And Aziza? She would be alone, waiting. Waiting up there in the golden sunlight for a man who could not return.
Earth, I thought, an earthen floor.
I could dig, but dig into what? In which direction? Back into the hill or away from it? And how deep into the earth did the foundations go?
Deliberately, like a drunken man, I forced my mind to view the problem. My will to live was fighting the foulness of the air. I forced myself to another circling of the wall. If worse came to worst, I could at least attempt the climb. The air would be fresher the closer I got to that open crack.
I could not, I would not, give up.
Suddenly, my fingers encountered a step. I found the lowest one and sat down. Think … I must think. My mind fumbled with the idea.
If there was a way out, my brain must find it. My skull throbbed heavily, and I tried to force my thoughts to deal with the problem. Leaning my elbows on my knees, I held my aching head in my hands. My leg felt cold.
Cold … cold because I was soaking wet. Yet I was hot. I was perspiring, so why should my leg be cold?
Air! It had to be air! Cold, fresh, wonderful air!
I dropped to my knees, my fingers tearing at the earth against the wall, seeking the life-giving breath of air, seeking the opening. My fingers found nothing, only cold stone. No opening … nothing!
Yet there was air, a trickle of it. Something I had done, some unwitting movement, some pressure of my body when searching around the well, perhaps my weight on the lower step. Flat on my face, I pressed my mouth against the opening and inhaled deeply. Again and again. Slowly the cool air revived me. Life returned, energy returned, my brain cleared.
My skull still throbbed, but now I could think, the dullness was gone. Eagerly, I dug my fingers into the crack and tugged. Nothing happened. My weight on the lower step seemed to make no difference. I pressed against the wall, felt for each particular stone. Nothing happened.
Then—I scarcely believed it. I heard a sound, a whisper of movement hardly to be detected. It was the first sound other than my own breathing that I had heard in what must have been hours. Yet it sounded as if something or someone were scratching at a stone!
Pressing my mouth to the opening, I said, “Is someone there?”
A low cry answered. “Mathurin! You are alive!”
“I’ve no light. I lost my candle on the stair. Can you find the door?”
For a few moments there was silence, then I detected a faint stirring outside. She was doing something, what it was I could not guess. Suddenly, she spoke again. “It’s a lever, just like the other one! But it’s too high for me to reach!”