'Then see: I will go out of the cavern. Do not be afraid, but
watch.'

She went slowly out. The moment she turned her back to go, the
light began to pale and fade; the moment she was out of their sight
the place was black as night, save that now the smoky yellow-red of
their lamps, which they thought had gone out long ago, cast a dusky
glimmer around them.



CHAPTER 7
What Is in a Name?


For a time that seemed to them long, the two men stood waiting,
while still the Mother of Light did not return. So long was she
absent that they began to grow anxious: how were they to find their
way from the natural hollows of the mountain crossed by goblin
paths, if their lamps should go out? To spend the night there
would mean to sit and wait until an earthquake rent the mountain,
or the earth herself fell back into the smelting furnace of the sun
whence she had issued - for it was all night and no faintest dawn
in the bosom of the world.

So long did they wait unrevisited, that, had there not been two of
them, either would at length have concluded the vision a home-born
product of his own seething brain. And their lamps were going out,
for they grew redder and smokier! But they did not lose courage,