“One important thing,” she said gravely, “is the old minotaur. You forget that.” Truman gave her a pat on the behind as she turned. “Well, let’s deal with that when we meet it,” he said equably.
They crossed the lighted area of the cave hand in hand and began the long walk which was, unknown to themselves, going to lead them out on to the Roof of the World. Slowly they bored their way from vault to vault and chamber to chamber, buoying themselves up with private jokes against that evergrowing feeling of unreality which comes to those who spend too long in the darkness. Yet the routine of their march, by its very strictness, seemed to have a purpose, a meaning. It was difficult going, for Truman used the torch as sparingly as possible, and the surfaces were widely different in structure, the faults and abruptions of the rock-face frequent. From time to time their hopes were raised as they passed abruptly into some dimly-lit cavern in which the shafts of sunlight, distilled and diluted in that green air, turned languidly in spirals or shuddered into activity as they passed and disturbed them.
Elsie Truman was heartily grateful for her stout shoes and the coat. She talked a good deal, partly because the sound of her own voice was something she could not do without, partly to show her husband that her morale could answer every demand made upon it. He, for his part, hardly bothered to answer her, except with an occasional grunt. His whole energy was concentrated upon the journey itself, his mind, so to speak, was always ahead of them forearmed against possible pitfalls and disappointments, against dangers and disasters which might at any step overcome them. And wherever the track seemed wide enough he came up beside his wife and took her arm, unconsciously re-creating those thousand and one walks they had taken together, in comfortable familiarity, arm in arm; contributing to her own optimism and courage a sense of plausible continuity, a hope for the future. In his own mind, however, Truman was re-living those exciting films of his childhood which always ended with a chase across the underground cellars of Paris, or across the crooked roof-tops of London. They constituted the only poetry he had ever known, and now, as they toiled from cavern to cavern, from gallery to crumbling gallery, he could not help but imagine himself as a character in The Prisoner of Zenda or Toilers of the Sea, battling his way up towards the daylight. His mind was absolutely without fear, because he was convinced that his time had not yet come — as convinced as he had been during the bombardments of the late war. And this conviction seemed to place a merciful veil between himself and the reality in which he had become involved. Somewhere, quite near, was the real world where flowers blossomed and trees grew; there were human beings like himself obsessed with small problems, small responsibilities. Truman was quite determined not to lose his hold upon this world which, it seemed to him, he had hardly had time to get to know. So deliberate was this certainty that his wife impelled herself to test it from time to time with a remark like, “I’ve had enough of this. Why don’t we sit down a bit?” or “What about lunch? Don’t want me to die of hunger, do you?” He treated these reservations upon an agreed attitude as meaningless interruptions to a continuity of purpose he was determined to maintain. And regarding him, seeing his set and resolute features, and the way his neck had drawn itself into his body — the watchful, condensed approach of a boxer to an opponent — she was at once revived and restored in her own feminine resolution.
They stumbled and crawled through a network of caves and galleries filled with this delusive half-light which reminded her, as she said, of the Aquarium of Brighton; in which she half expected to see the vast and gloomy forms of fishes dawdling through the crannies and corridors around them. In the centre of one of them, scooped clear in the cold stone, lay what at first seemed to be a miniature lake — its black surface untouched by reflections or movements. She gave a little cry of interest and pleasure and advanced towards it with the intention of washing her face in it: but as she stopped, taking off her hat, her husband caught her arm. He was staring keenly down at the polished surface. They were aware of a faint sour smell, like that of slightly burnt milk. “Wash your face in that, would you?” said Truman softly, more to himself than to her, and, reaching down, picked up a twig off the floor. “Look.” He dipped the twig into the liquid and drew it out, letting the bitumen run sluggishly from its end, smoking like black sealing-wax. “Well I never,” she said, “it’s tar. How did it get down here?” It provided her husband with an excuse for a homily upon feminine irresponsibility and the evils thereof. He did not spare her, and she listened to him, outwardly very meek, but inwardly smiling in fond amusement at this oftrepeated performance. His concern was flattering, even if his opinion of her intelligence was not.