Immediately after we resumed the march, and though I realized
that in some way I had offended Dian the Beautiful I could not prevail
upon her to talk with me that I might learn wherein I had
erred—in fact I might quite as well have been addressing a
sphinx for all the attention I got. At last my own foolish pride stepped
in and prevented my making any further attempts, and thus a companionship
that without my realizing it had come to mean a great deal to me was cut
off. Thereafter I confined my conversation to Perry. Hooja did not renew
his advances toward the girl, nor did he again venture near me.
Again the weary and apparently interminable marching became a
perfect nightmare of horrors to me. The more firmly fixed became the
realization that the girl's friendship had meant so much to me, the more I
came to miss it; and the more impregnable the barrier of silly pride. But
I was very young and would not ask Ghak for the explanation which I was
sure he could give, and that might have made everything all right
again.
On the march, or during halts, Dian refused
consistently to notice me—when her eyes wandered in my direction
she looked either over my head or directly through me. At last I became
desperate, and determined to swallow my self-esteem, and again beg her to
tell me how I had offended, and how I might make reparation. I made up my
mind that I should do this at the next halt. We were approaching another
range of mountains at the time, and when we reached them, instead of
winding across them through some high-flung pass we entered a mighty
natural tunnel—a series of labyrinthine grottoes, dark as
Erebus.
The guards had no torches or light of any
description. In fact we had seen no artificial light or sign of fire since
we had entered Pellucidar. In a land of perpetual noon there is no need of
light above ground, yet I marveled that they had no means of lighting
their way through these dark, subterranean passages. So we crept along at
a snail's pace, with much stumbling and falling—the guards
keeping up a singsong chant ahead of us, interspersed with certain high
notes which I found always indicated rough places and
turns.