down below the surface of the pool. He groped downwards, trying to trace
the sill of the opening, He felt what seemed to be blocks of roughly
dressed masonry, and reached down further until the water reached
halfway up his biceps.
Suddenly some living creature, swift and weighty, swirled in the dark
waters right in front of his face, and as an immediate reflex he jerked
his arm out of the water.
The thing followed his arm up to the surface, slashing at his bare flesh
with long, needle'sharp fangs, and he had a glimpse of a head as evil
and villainous as that of a barracuda' He realized instinctively that it
must have been attracted by the smell of the blood from his injured
thumb.
He leaped to his feet and teetered on the narrow ledge, clutching his
arm. Only one of the creature's frontal fangs had touched him, but it
had opened the skin like a razor cut, a long shallow wound across the
back of his right hand from which fresh blood dribbled and splattered
into the pool at his feet.
Instantly the black waters seemed to come alive, roiling and seething
with frenzied writhing aquatic shapes.
Nicholas, his back flattened against the rock wall, stared down at them
with loathing and horror. He could vaguely make out the shape of them,
sinuous and ribbonlike, some of them as thick as his calf, black and
gleaming.
One of them thrust its head out on to the ledge and snapped its jaws.
Its eyes were huge and glistening and its snout was elongated, the long
jaws lined with fangs that overlapped its thin lips. The body behind the
head was six feet long, and lashed like a whip as it drove itself high
up on to the ledge, reaching out for Nicholas's bare legs. He shouted
with revulsion and leaped back, stumbling and splashing on to safer
footing. Clutching his bleeding hand, stare aC Ae evi . aead had
disappeared, but the surface of the pool was still agitated by the lithe
ophidian shapes.
"Eels!the realized. "Giant tropical eels."
Of course the blood had excited them. The fall in the water-level had
trapped them in the pool, congregated them in such numbers that they had
probably already devoured the fish that they depended upon for food. Now
they were ravenous. Probably all the pools of water that remained in the
abyss were infested with these fearsome creatures. He was thankful that
during his last swim in this pool he had not bled into the water.
He unwound the cotton kerchief from his neck and wrapped it round his
wounded hand. The eels were a deadly threat to any attempt to explore
the opening in the cliff.
A, il " the pool of 1V But already he was considering ways of ridding
them and of gaining access to the underwater opening.
Slowly the frenzy in the pool quietened and its surface grew still
again, Nicholas looked up to see the bosun's chair descending, with
Royan's slim, shapely legs dangling below the wooden seat.
"What have you found?" she called down to him excitedly. "Is there a
tunnel-' then she broke off suddenly as she saw the blood on his
clothing, and the bandage wathing his hand.
"Oh dear God," she exclaimed. "What have you done?
You are hurt. How badly?" Her feet touched the ledge beside him and she
slid from the chair and took his injured hand gently. "What have you
done to yourself?"
"It's not as bad as it looks, he assured her. "Lots of blood but not
deep."
"How did you do it?" she insisted.
For an answer he tore a corner off the bloodstained kerchief. "Watch!"
he instructed her, wadding it into a ball and tossing it out into the
pool.
Royan screamed with horror as the waters boiled with the long fleeting
shapes. One of them wriggled half its monstrous length out on to the
ledge, before flopping back.
It left a shining trail of silver slime across the black stones.
"Taita has left his guard dogs to see us A' Nicholas remarked. "We are
going to have to take care of those beauties before we can explore the
entrance below the surface."
/4P- -I he bamboo scaffolding that Sapper and Nicholas had built down
the cliff was L*, - anchored in the niches that had been cut into the
rock nearly four thousand years before. Taita had probably lashed his
framework together with bark rope, but Sapper had used heavy-gauge
galvanized wire, and the structure was strong enough to bear the weight
of many men. The Buffaloes formed a living chain and passed all the
material and equipment down the scaffolding from hand to hand.
The very first piece of equipment to reach the floor Of the cavern was
the portable Honda EM500 generator.
Sapper connected it up to the lights that he had rigged along the foot
of the cliff. The small petrol engine ran smoothly and quietly, but the
amount of power it put out was impressive. The floodlights chased the
shadows from the furthest corners of the cavern, and lit the deep rock
bowl like a stage.
Immediately the mood changed. Everybody became more cheerful and
confident. There was laughter and excited chatter from the chain of men
on the scaffolding as Royan climbed down to join Sapper and Nicholas at
the side of the pool.
"Now that we know that they are working, switch off those lights,'
Nicholas ordered.
"It's so dark and gloomy without them," Royan protested.
"Saving fuel," Nicholas explained. "No filling station on the corner. We
only have two hundred litres in reserve, and although the little Honda
is pretty economical we have to be careful We don't know how long we are
going to need it in the tunnel."
Royan shrugged with resignation, and when Sapper cut the generator the
cavern was plunged once more into gloom and shadow. She looked at the
dark pool and pulled a face.
"What are you going to do about those horrid pets of yours?" she
demanded, glancing at Nicholas's bandaged right hand.
"Sapper and I have worked out a plan. We thought of trying to empty the
pool completely, using a bucket chain.
But the amount of water still coming down the river bed makes that a
poor choice."
"We would be lucky to hold our own against that flow, even working
around the clock with buckets," Sapper grunted. "If only the major had
thought to bring along a high-speed water pump-'
"Even I can't think of everything, Sapper. What we are going to do is to
build a small coffer dam around the riderwater opening, and bale that
out with buckets."
Royan stood back and watched the preparations. Half a dozen of the empty
mesh gabions were carried down the scaffolding and placed at the edge of
the pool. Here they were partially filled with boulders that the men
gathered up from the river bed. However the gabions were not filled so
full that they became too heavy to handle. There was no front-ender down
here to move them around, and they would be forced to rely on
old-fashioned manpower. There was just sufficient of the yellow PVC
sheeting left over to wrap around each gabion and render it waterproof.
"What about your eels?" Royan was fascinated by these loathsome
creatures, and she hung well back from the edge of the pool. "You can't
send any of your men in there!