Amazing Stories — page 66: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Pen . AMAZING STORIES the beginning, lay directly between me and the reser- voir and, since it was easy to climb, I started up its side. It was covered with low brush and weeds that hid the surface of the ground from view, but did not greatly impede my progress. I plowed my way to the top and started across the rounded back, to- ward the reservoir. I had gone only a few paces when, without warning, the ground gave way beneath my feet and I soon found myself, in a heap, in the gravel, at the bottom of what seemed to me to be an over-sized cistern. “T was not injured but I was considerably shaken up, for I had fallen about ten feet. For a moment 1 was inclined to laugh at myseli, for I cut a funny figure sitting there, hunched up. But there was noth- ing to laugh at. I found myself in a serious position, for I was imprisoned at the bottom of a hole, sur- rounded by unscalable walls of loose gravel. More- over, no one had seen me at or near this isolated place, so unless a miracle happened, no one ever would come in time to find me alive. Well, sitting there, staring at the opening through which I had fallen would do no good, so I began to take my sur- roundings into serious consideration. “Tt soon became evident that the hole had been dug by some one for a definite purpose; what that purpose was I had no idea. The opening at the top, I discovered, had been covered with planks which, in the course of a short time had become covered with earth and vegetable matter; in turn this furnished soil in which had grown the weeds that hid the spot. None of the boards had fallen into the hole, nor was there anything I could use to enable me to reach the opening. As there was nothing else I could do, I decided to kick gravel from the walls and heap it up until the pile was high enough to enable me to reach beyond the broken boards, grasp some bush, or other thing, and get out. “T knew I had a tedious job ahead, for I had only my hands to use as a shovel. At one side of the hole, quite a pile of gravel had fallen of its own weight, which gave me a good start, I thought. Throwing double handfuls into the center of the floor soon proved to be a bad job. My hat also proved too slow a method, so I spread my coat, filled it, then carried it over to the slowly growing mound, on which I dumped these accumulations. “T had a heap about three feet high when, in scooping up another double handful, my fingers came in contact with the surface of a box. I soon had it uncovered fully and found it to be about a foot deep, fifteen inches wide, and about two feet long. I was about to kick the cover off, in order to find out what, if anything, it contained, when I was moved to ex- amine it a little more closely first. It was a good thing I obeyed the impulse, because, after carefully prying off the cover, which had begun to show signs of dry rot, I discovered a two gallon cannister of nitro-glycerine. \ “The reason for the hole became apparent at once. It had been used as a chamber for explosives while the reservoir was in process of construction, and this box very likely had been overlooked when the work was finished. “Very carefully I carried it over and laid it on its side, on top of the little heap of gravel. Digging further I found another box, and another, until I had found fifteen. I piled these, pyramid fashion, under the hole through which I had fallen; then -” = A 9 . r << holding my breath and taking care not to make a false step, I climbed to the top and soon found my- self in the sunshine once more where I could breathe freely. b6 HEN I reached the reservoir, I found the trout jumping. The fish problem settled, I started back toward the house for my tackle. I was about half the way to the fence when I saw Wilson, a ~ long stick in his hand, trying to head off a cow that had broken from the corral, and was now headed for the lake. “Mules are supposed to be, and are, stubborn, but when it comes to downright ‘orneryness,’ I think a cow is pretty much of a fool. Added to this, cows are nervous things, ready to stampede at a moment’s notice and when they get a notion into their heads, you can’t club it out. “Now, this cow was a Holstein, and valuable so, when Wilson saw her heading for the lake he very naturally objected, considering the sort of tenant that lake harbored. “T was too far away to be of assistance and the beast was too much for him alone. Dodging past his swinging club, she drove, head on, for the water, her tail, so it seemed, flapping, in derision. She was still on the gallop when she reached the water, so she went entirely under. I saw her come up, a few yards from the bank and, cow-wise, start for the farther shore. I don’t know why a cow will always, under similar circumstances, make for the farthest point, unless it is because as I said, they are just plain fools. “Tn his anxiety over his cow, Wilson forgot some- thing he should have remembered: if the lake was a dangerous place for the Holstein, 1t was even more dangerous for him. But he may never have thought about the lizard at all. At any rate he ran to the little dock that projected out into the water, and, getting into the boat that was tied there, began to row frantically after old bossy. “T was too far away to warn him of his danger, although it didn’t actually seem great then; the lake, like a great blue gem bathed in the golden rays of the afternoon sun, suggested nothing further than dimpled beauty, made somewhat sinister by the knowledge that, deep down in its sapphire depth there had been, and might at the moment be, a nameless and monstrous horror. I guess I have become a bit of a fatalist; it seems to me, things are pretty much laid out for us from the beginning. We are sup- posed to be ‘free moral agents,’ according to the clergy, yet I wonder if we really are. Of course, Wilson did not have to go out on the lake. Nor would he have gone if he had stopped to think. But blame can hardly be attached to him for not stopping to think. He never did. “By the time I reached the spot where the cow went into the water, the animal was about a hundred yards from shore, headed back, for Wilson had over- taken her and made her turn back. There wasn’t a thing to be nervous about, so far as appearances went, but I was worried, and I urged him to hurry. He ‘waved his hand and nodded and that was the last thing he ever did. His hand had barely grasped the oar again when, silently, from the blue depths, there came into view, just behind Wilson, the awful head and neck of the creature, whose shadow we had dimly seen that night, when we_sat, crouched on a COMNMUCIOOS GOL . rig we ~ fom > a ad 6 ek ek nt ~ eae :