ve,
where its light would not be seen, and sat down by its warmth to eat
dried figs and bread and drink brackish water. To-morrow he meant to
catch a kid and roast it and eat it. Why should he ever go home again?
Kid was good--he did not get that to eat when he was at home; and now in
the streets the boys must be looking for him to play at their cruel game
of hanging. Why should he go back at all?

The fire licked its way up the long walls of the cavern; slowly the
warmth crept round on all sides. The rock where Beppo laid his hand was
no longer damp and cold; he made himself a bed of the driest litter in
a niche close to the fire, laid his head on a smooth knob of stone, and
slept. But even in his sleep he remembered his fire, dreading to awake
and find himself in darkness. Every time the warmth of it diminished he
raised himself and put on more fuel.

In the morning--for faint blue edges of light marking the ridged throat
of the cavern told that outside the day had begun--he woke fully, and
the fire still burned. As he lay, his pillow of rock felt warm and
almost soft; and, strangely enough, through it there went a beating
sound as of blood. This must be his own brain that he heard; but he
lifted his head, and where he laid his hand could feel a slow movement
of life going on under it. Then he stared hard at the overhanging rock,
and surely it heaved softly up and down, like some great thing breathing
slowly in its sleep.

Yet he could make out no shape at all till, having run to the other side
of the cave, he turned to see the whole face of the rock which seemed to
be taking on life. Then he realised very gradually what looked to be the
throat and jaws of a great monster lying along the ground, while all the
rest passed away into shadow or lay buried under masses of rock, which
closed round it like a mould. Below the nether jaw-bone the flames
licked and caressed the throat; and the tough, mud-coloured hide ruffled
and smoothed again as if grateful for the heat that tickled its way in.

Very slowly indeed the great Cockatrice, which had lain buried for
thousands of years, out of reach of the light or heat of the sun, was
coming round again to life. That was Beppo's own doing, and for some
very curious reason he was not afraid.

His heart was uplifted. "This is my cave," thought he, "so this must be
my Cockatrice! Now I will ride out on him and conquer the world. I shall
be really a king then!"

He guessed that