To be sure, a three-cornered tunnel th
second floor back of a lofty cave, would K
the last place to look for such an ambush
unless there was some fly-trap opening to
it from above. But there might be!

Boys and girls, both, their blood flamed
upon the fear, then froze--until the
silence, the bat-churned cave silence, was
hung with icicles above them.

Then, once more, it was ripped from
on top by that perishing shriek--passing
strange, remote--but now it was
as if the fissure's three-cornered mouth
rilled with it, faintly gibbered the one
word: "C-caught!"

'Caught!' Oh! Stud, you warned
him; it's his own doing. Let those other
two boys--his friends--climb up to him!
Well--if you feel--you--must f"

Jessie's cry gibbered in agony in her
throat, too, liquid as the thrush~t-??ne in
terror for its mate. But it struck a high
note at the end.

For Stud's hand was groping mechani-
[[144]]

p143 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p144w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p145

v?