Chapter XVIII: Exit Oolanga

by Bram Stoker

　　The woman turned sharply as Adam touched her shoulder."One moment whilst we are alone. You had better not trust thatnigger!" he whispered.Her answer was crisp and concise:"I don't.""Forewarned is forearmed. Tell me if you will--it is for your ownprotection. Why do you mistrust him?""My friend, you have no idea of that man's impudence. Would youbelieve that he wants me to marry him?""No!" said Adam incredulously, amused in spite of himself."Yes, and wanted to bribe me to do it by sharing a chest oftreasure--at least, he thought it was--stolen from Mr. Caswall. Whydo you distrust him, Mr. Salton?""Did you notice that box he had slung on his shoulder? That belongsto me. I left it in the gun-room when I went to lunch. He musthave crept in and stolen it. Doubtless he thinks that it, too, isfull of treasure.""He does!""How on earth do you know?" asked Adam."A little while ago he offered to give it to me--another bribe toaccept him. Faugh! I am ashamed to tell you such a thing. Thebeast!"Whilst they had been speaking, she had opened the door, a narrowiron one, well hung, for it opened easily and closed tightly withoutany creaking or sound of any kind. Within all was dark; but sheentered as freely and with as little misgiving or restraint as if ithad been broad daylight. For Adam, there was just sufficient greenlight from somewhere for him to see that there was a broad flight ofheavy stone steps leading upward; but Lady Arabella, after shuttingthe door behind her, when it closed tightly without a clang, trippedup the steps lightly and swiftly. For an instant all was dark, butthere came again the faint green light which enabled him to see theoutlines of things. Another iron door, narrow like the first andfairly high, led into another large room, the walls of which were ofmassive stones, so closely joined together as to exhibit only onesmooth surface. This presented the appearance of having at one timebeen polished. On the far side, also smooth like the walls, was thereverse of a wide, but not high, iron door. Here there was a littlemore light, for the high-up aperture over the door opened to theair.Lady Arabella took from her girdle another small key, which sheinserted in a keyhole in the centre of a massive lock. The greatbolt seemed wonderfully hung, for the moment the small key wasturned, the bolts of the great lock moved noiselessly and the irondoors swung open. On the stone steps outside stood Oolanga, withthe mongoose box slung over his shoulder. Lady Arabella stood alittle on one side, and the African, accepting the movement as aninvitation, entered in an obsequious way. The moment, however, thathe was inside, he gave a quick look around him."Much death here--big death. Many deaths. Good, good!"He sniffed round as if he was enjoying the scent. The matter andmanner of his speech were so revolting that instinctively Adam'shand wandered to his revolver, and, with his finger on the trigger,he rested satisfied that he was ready for any emergency.There was certainly opportunity for the nigger's enjoyment, for theopen well-hole was almost under his nose, sending up such a stenchas almost made Adam sick, though Lady Arabella seemed not to mind itat all. It was like nothing that Adam had ever met with. Hecompared it with all the noxious experiences he had ever had--thedrainage of war hospitals, of slaughter-houses, the refuse ofdissecting rooms. None of these was like it, though it hadsomething of them all, with, added, the sourness of chemical wasteand the poisonous effluvium of the bilge of a water-logged shipwhereon a multitude of rats had been drowned.Then, quite unexpectedly, the negro noticed the presence of a thirdperson--Adam Salton! He pulled out a pistol and shot at him,happily missing. Adam was himself usually a quick shot, but thistime his mind had been on something else and he was not ready.However, he was quick to carry out an intention, and he was not acoward. In another moment both men were in grips. Beside them wasthe dark well-hole, with that horrid effluvium stealing up from itsmysterious depths.Adam and Oolanga both had pistols; Lady Arabella, who had not one,was probably the most ready of them all in the theory of shooting,but that being impossible, she made her effort in another way.Gliding forward, she tried to seize the African; but he eluded hergrasp, just missing, in doing so, falling into the mysterious hole.As he swayed back to firm foothold, he turned his own gun on her andshot. Instinctively Adam leaped at his assailant; clutching at eachother, they tottered on the very brink.Lady Arabella's anger, now fully awake, was all for Oolanga. Shemoved towards him with her hands extended, and had just seized himwhen the catch of the locked box--due to some movement from within--flew open, and the king-cobra-killer flew at her with a venomousfury impossible to describe. As it seized her throat, she caughthold of it, and, with a fury superior to its own, tore it in twojust as if it had been a sheet of paper. The strength used for suchan act must have been terrific. In an instant, it seemed to spoutblood and entrails, and was hurled into the well-hole. In anotherinstant she had seized Oolanga, and with a swift rush had drawn him,her white arms encircling him, down with her into the gapingaperture.Adam saw a medley of green and red lights blaze in a whirlingcircle, and as it sank down into the well, a pair of blazing greeneyes became fixed, sank lower and lower with frightful rapidity, anddisappeared, throwing upward the green light which grew more andmore vivid every moment. As the light sank into the noisome depths,there came a shriek which chilled Adam's blood--a prolonged agony ofpain and terror which seemed to have no end.Adam Salton felt that he would never be able to free his mind fromthe memory of those dreadful moments. The gloom which surroundedthat horrible charnel pit, which seemed to go down to the verybowels of the earth, conveyed from far down the sights and sounds ofthe nethermost hell. The ghastly fate of the African as he sankdown to his terrible doom, his black face growing grey with terror,his white eyeballs, now like veined bloodstone, rolling in thehelpless extremity of fear. The mysterious green light was initself a milieu of horror. And through it all the awful cry came upfrom that fathomless pit, whose entrance was flooded with spots offresh blood. Even the death of the fearless little snake-killer--sofierce, so frightful, as if stained with a ferocity which told of noliving force above earth, but only of the devils of the pit--wasonly an incident. Adam was in a state of intellectual tumult, whichhad no parallel in his experience. He tried to rush away from thehorrible place; even the baleful green light, thrown up through thegloomy well-shaft, was dying away as its source sank deeper into theprimeval ooze. The darkness was closing in on him in overwhelmingdensity--darkness in such a place and with such a memory of it!He made a wild rush forward--slipt on the steps in some sticky,acrid-smelling mass that felt and smelt like blood, and, fallingforward, felt his way into the inner room, where the well-shaft wasnot.Then he rubbed his eyes in sheer amazement. Up the stone steps fromthe narrow door by which he had entered, glided the white-cladfigure of Lady Arabella, the only colour to be seen on her beingblood-marks on her face and hands and throat. Otherwise, she wascalm and unruffled, as when earlier she stood aside for him to passin through the narrow iron door.