r
heads.

To Grom's unshaken wits, it was clear on the instant what had
happened. He staggered to his feet and looked back through a rain of
falling rock-splinters. He had a vision of their colossal pursuer, its
jaws stretched to their utmost width, the vast globes of its eyes
protruding from their armored sockets, its ponderous, bowed fore-legs
pawing the air aimlessly in the final convulsion. The falling
rock-mass had caught it on the middle of the back, crushing its mighty
frame like an eggshell.

For a second or two, Grom stood there rigid, staring, his gnarled
fingers clenched upon his weapons. Then a second earthquake tremor
beneath his feet warned him. With an unerring instinct, he sprang on
up the slope after his companions, who had fled as soon as they could
pick themselves up. And in the next moment the rock above his head,
fissured deep by the rains, slipped again. With a growling screech, as
if torn from the bowels of the mountain, it settled slowly down, and
sealed the mouth of the cave to utter blackness.

Grom stopped short, having no mind to dash out his brains against the
rock. There was stillness at last, and silence save for the faint,
humming moan of the earthquake which seemed to come from vast depths
beneath his feet. Profoundly awed, but master of his spirit, he stood
leaning upon his spear in the thick dark till the last of that strange
humming note had died away. Then, through a silence so thick it seemed
to choke him, he called aloud:

"A-ya! where are you?"

"_Grom!_" came the girl's answer, a sobbing cry of relief and joy,
from almost, as it seemed, beneath his outstretched hand.

"We are all here," came the voices of the three men.

They had fallen headlong at the second shock, as at the first; and in
the darkness they had not dared to rise again, but lay waiting for
their leader to tell them what to do. In half a dozen cautious,
groping steps he was among them, and sank down by A-ya's side,
clutching her to him to stop her trembling.

"What are we to do now?" asked the girl, after a long silence. Without
Grom, they would probably have died where they were, not daring to
stir in the darkness. But their faith in their chief kept them
cheerful even in this desperate plight.

"We must find a way out," answered Grom, with resolute confidence.

"If Hobbo had not dropped the fire!" said young Mo bitterly.

The giant groaned in self-abasement, and beat his chest with his great
fists.