Bird too; and others were drawn by
same abstract birdlime--or else the
bat??stirred cave had lures.

"There--there 's a secret lobby in it,"
said Stud, "a dark, rocky passage lead-ng
off from that queer black, three-cornered
fissure in the right wall, ten feet
from the ground--I guess nobody has
ever explored it; nobody has cracked the
nut of what's behind that triangular
crevice, so high up!"

"Come--come; that sounds exciting,
very exciting!" remarked Tanpa, the Guardian,
remaining behind too, as chaperon.

But her husband wheeled upon his jogtrot
off after water, swinging his galvanized
iron bucket after a manner to
give the air the blues.

"Well! I wouldn't try to crack the@
nut, solve the riddle, of what's behind@
that queer-shaped crevice, Stud," he said.
'It's black--black as a tinker's pot@
in there. You wouldn't know what you
were heading into!"

[[137]]

p136 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p137w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p138

v?