"
And for quite a minute Gerald shamedly felt that he had not been
quite, quite kind.
So now, leaving the growing goldness of the sunrise, the four went
down the stone steps that led to the underground and underwater
passage, and everything seemed to grow dark and then to grow into
a poor pretence of light again, as the splendour of dawn gave place
to the small dogged lighting of the bicycle lamp. The steps did
indeed lead to a passage, the beginnings of it choked with the
drifted dead leaves of many old autumns. But presently the passage
took a turn, there were more steps, down, down, and then the
passage was empty and straight lined above and below and on each
side with slabs of marble, very clear and clean. Gerald held Cathy's
hand with more of kindness and less of exasperation than he had
supposed possible.
And Cathy, on her part, was surprised to find it possible to be so
much less frightened than she expected.
The flame of the bull's-eye threw ahead a soft circle of misty light
the children followed it silently. Till, silently and suddenly, the
light of the bull's-eye behaved as the flame of a candle does when
you take it out into the sunlight to light a bonfire, or explode a
train of gunpowder, or what not. Because now, with feelings
mixed indeed, of wonder, and interest, and awe, but no fear, the
children found themselves in a great hail, whose arched roof was
held up by two rows of round pillars, and whose every corner was
filled with a soft, searching, lovely light, filling every cranny, as
water fills the rocky secrecies of hidden sea-caves.
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