Page:The Case of Charles Dexter Ward - Lovecraft - 1971.pdf/3



As he walked slowly about the hideous subterranean cavern, it occurred to Willett that both the noise and the odor seemed strongest directly above the oddly pierced slabs, as if they might be crude trapdoors leading down still deeper to some region of horror.

At his touch, the moaning beneath ascended to a louder key, and only with vast trepidation did he lift the heavy stone. A stench unnameable now rose up from below, and the doctor's head reeled dizzily as he laid back the slab and turned his torch upon the exposed square yard of gaping blackness.

For a second he could distinguish nothing but the slimy, moss-green brick walls, then he saw that something dark was leaping clumsily and frantically up and down at the bottom of the shaft. A few seconds later he was as stark mad as any inmate at the hospital—and screaming!