Buried Alive: a Tale of These Days by Arnold Bennett
page 46 of 233 (19%)
page 46 of 233 (19%)
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"Hurry up, please," came a voice out of the spectral gloom. Mrs.
Challice thereupon ran. Now up the tunnel, opposing all human progress there blew a steady trade-wind of tremendous force. Immediately Priam began to run the trade-wind removed his hat, which sailed buoyantly back towards the street. He was after it like a youth of twenty, and he recaptured it. But when he reached the extremity of the tunnel his amazed eyes saw nothing but a great cage of human animals pressed tightly together behind bars. There Was a click, and the whole cage sank from his sight into the earth. He felt that there was more than he had dreamt of in the city of miracles. In a couple of minutes another cage rose into the tunnel at a different point, vomited its captives and descended swiftly again with Priam and many others, and threw him and the rest out into a white mine consisting of numberless galleries. He ran about these interminable galleries underneath London, at the bidding of painted hands, for a considerable time, and occasionally magic trains without engines swept across his vision. But he could not find even the spirit of Mrs. Alice Challice in this nether world. _The Nest_ On letter-paper headed "Grand Babylon Hotel, London," he was writing in a disguised backward hand a note to the following effect: "Duncan Farll, Esq. Sir,--If any letters or telegrams arrive for me at Selwood Terrace, be good enough to have them forwarded to me at once to the above address.--Yours truly, H. Leek." It cost him something to sign the name of the dead man; but he instinctively guessed that Duncan Farll might be |
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