The Lost World
particularly bright and clear one, so that the whole extent of the
plateau was visible beneath me. It was, as seen from this height, of
an oval contour, with a breadth of about thirty miles and a width of
twenty. Its general shape was that of a shallow funnel, all the sides
sloping down to a considerable lake in the center. This lake may have
been ten miles in circumference, and lay very green and beautiful in
the evening light, with a thick fringe of reeds at its edges, and with
its surface broken by several yellow sandbanks, which gleamed golden in
the mellow sunshine. A number of long dark objects, which were too
large for alligators and too long for canoes, lay upon the edges of
these patches of sand. With my glass I could clearly see that they
were alive, but what their nature might be I could not imagine.
From the side of the plateau on which we were, slopes of woodland, with
occasional glades, stretched down for five or six miles to the central
lake. I could see at my very feet the glade of the iguanodons, and
farther off was a round opening in the trees which marked the swamp of
the pterodactyls. On the side facing me, however, the plateau
presented a very different aspect. There the basalt cliffs of the
outside were reproduced upon the inside, forming an escarpment about
two hundred feet high, with a woody slope beneath it. Along the base
of these red cliffs, some distance above the ground, I could see a
number of dark holes through the glass, which I conjectured to be the
mouths of caves. At the opening of one of these something white was
shimmering, but I was unable to make out what it was. I sat charting
the country until the sun had set and it was so dark that I could no
longer distinguish details. Then I climbed down to my companions
waiting for me so eagerly at the bottom of the great tree. For once I
was the hero of the expedition. Alone I had thought of it, and alone I
had done it; and here was the chart which would save us a month's blind
groping among unknown dangers. Each of them shook me solemnly by the
hand.
But before they discussed the details of my map I had to tell them of
my encounter with the ape-man among the branches.
"He has been there all the time," said I.
"How do you know that?" asked Lord John.
"Because I have never been without that feeling that something
malevolent was watching us. I mentioned it to you, Professor
Challenger."
"Our young friend certainly said something of the kind. He is also the
one among us who is endowed with that Celtic temperament which would
make him sensitive to such impressions."
"The whole theory of telepathy----" began Summerlee, filling his pipe.
"Is too vast to be now discussed," said Challenger, with decision.
"Tell me, now," he added, with the air of a bishop addressing a
Sunday-school, "did you happen to observe whether the creature could
cross its thumb over its palm?"
"No, indeed."
"Had it a tail?"
"No."
"Was the foot prehensile?"
"I do not think it could have made off so fast among the branches if it
could not get a grip with its feet."
"In South America there are, if my memory serves me--you will check the
observation, Professor Summerlee--some thirty-six species of monkeys,
but the anthropoid ape is unknown. It is clear, however, that he
exists in this country, and that he is not the hairy, gorilla-like
variety, which is never seen out of Africa or the East." (I was
inclined to interpolate, as I looked at him, that I had seen his first
cousin in Kensington.) "This is a whiskered and colorless type, the
latter characteristic pointing to the fact that he spends his days in
arboreal seclusion. The question which we have to face is whether he
approaches more closely to the ape or the man. In the latter case, he
may well approximate to what the vulgar have called the 'missing link.'
The solution of this problem is our immediate duty."
"It is nothing of the sort," said Summerlee, abruptly. "Now that,
through the intelligence and activity of Mr. Malone" (I cannot help
quoting the words), "we have got our chart, our one and only immediate
duty is to get ourselves safe and sound out of this awful place."
"The flesh-pots of civilization," groaned Challenger.
"The ink-pots of civilization, sir. It is our task to put on record
what we have seen, and to leave the further exploration to others. You
all agreed as much before Mr. Malone got us the chart."
"Well," said Challenger, "I admit that my mind will be more at ease
when I am assured that the result of our expedition has been conveyed
to our friends. How we are to get down from this place I have not as
yet an idea. I have never yet encountered any problem, however, which
my inventive brain was unable to solve, and I promise you that
to-morrow I will turn my attention to the question of our descent."
And so the matter was allowed to rest.
But that evening, by the light of the fire and of a single candle, the
first map of the lost world was elaborated. Every detail which I had
roughly noted from my watch-tower was drawn out in its relative place.
Challenger's pencil hovered over the great blank which marked the lake.
"What shall we call it?" he asked.
"Why should you not take the chance of perpetuating your own name?"
said Summerlee, with his usual touch of acidity.
"I trust, sir, that my name will have other and more personal claims
upon posterity," said Challenger, severely. "Any ignoramus can hand
down his worthless memory by imposing it upon a mountain or a river. I
need no such monument."
Summerlee, with a twisted smile, was about to make some fresh assault
when Lord John hastened to intervene.
"It's up to you, young fellah, to name the lake," said he. "You saw it
first, and, by George, if you choose to put 'Lake Malone' on it, no one
has a better right."
"By all means. Let our young friend give it a name," said Challenger.
"Then," said I, blushing, I dare say, as I said it, "let it be named
Lake Gladys."
"Don't you think the Central Lake would be more descriptive?" remarked
Summerlee.
"I should prefer Lake Gladys."
Challenger looked at me sympathetically, and shook his great head in
mock disapproval. "Boys will be boys," said he. "Lake Gladys let it
be."
CHAPTER XII
"It was Dreadful in the Forest"
I have said--or perhaps I have not said, for my memory plays me sad
tricks these days--that I glowed with pride when three such men as my
comrades thanked me for having saved, or at least greatly helped, the
situation. As the youngster of the party, not merely in years, but in
experience, character, knowledge, and all that goes to make a man, I
had been overshadowed from the first. And now I was coming into my
own. I warmed at the thought. Alas! for the pride which goes before a
fall! That little glow of self-satisfaction, that added measure of
self-confidence, were to lead me on that very night to the most
dreadful experience of my life, ending with a shock which turns my
heart sick when I think of it.
It came about in this way. I had been unduly excited by the adventure
of the tree, and sleep seemed to be impossible. Summerlee was on
guard, sitting hunched over our small fire, a quaint, angular figure,
his rifle across his knees and his pointed, goat-like beard wagging
with each weary nod of his head. Lord John lay silent, wrapped in the
South American poncho which he wore, while Challenger snored with a
roll and rattle which reverberated through the woods. The full moon
was shining brightly, and the air was crisply cold. What a night for a
walk! And then suddenly came the thought, "Why not?" Suppose I stole
softly away, suppose I made my way down to the central lake, suppose I
was back at breakfast with some record of the place--would I not in
that case be thought an even more worthy associate? Then, if Summerlee
carried the day and some means of escape were found, we should return
to London with first-hand knowledge of the central mystery of the
plateau, to which I alone, of all men, would have penetrated. I thought
of Gladys, with her "There are heroisms all round us." I seemed to hear
her voice as she said it. I thought also of McArdle. What a three
column article for the paper! What a foundation for a career! A
correspondentship in the next great war might be within my reach. I
clutched at a gun--my pockets were full of cartridges--and, parting the
thorn bushes at the gate of our zareba, quickly slipped out. My last
glance showed me the unconscious Summerlee, most futile of sentinels,
still nodding away like a queer mechanical toy in front of the
smouldering fire.
I had not gone a hundred yards before I deeply repented my rashness. I
may have said somewhere in this chronicle that I am too imaginative to
be a really courageous man, but that I have an overpowering fear of
seeming afraid. This was the power which now carried me onwards. I
simply could not slink back with nothing done. Even if my comrades
should not have missed me, and should never know of my weakness, there
would still remain some intolerable self-shame in my own soul. And yet
I shuddered at the position in which I found myself, and would have
given all I possessed at that moment to have been honorably free of the
whole business.
It was dreadful in the forest. The trees grew so thickly and their
foliage spread so widely that I could see nothing of the moon-light
save that here and there the high branches made a tangled filigree
against the starry sky. As the eyes became more used to the obscurity
one learned that there were different degrees of darkness among the
trees--that some were dimly visible, while between and among them there
were coal-black shadowed patches, like the mouths of caves, from which
I shrank in horror as I passed. I thought of the despairing yell of
the tortured iguanodon--that dreadful cry which had echoed through the
woods. I thought, too, of the glimpse I had in the light of Lord
John's torch of that bloated, warty, blood-slavering muzzle. Even now
I was on its hunting-ground. At any instant it might spring upon me
from the shadows--this nameless and horrible monster. I stopped, and,
picking a cartridge from my pocket, I opened the breech of my gun. As
I touched the lever my heart leaped within me. It was the shot-gun,
not the rifle, which I had taken!
Again the impulse to return swept over me. Here, surely, was a most
excellent reason for my failure--one for which no one would think the
less of me. But again the foolish pride fought against that very word.
I could not--must not--fail. After all, my rifle would probably have
been as useless as a shot-gun against such dangers as I might meet. If
I were to go back to camp to change my weapon I could hardly expect to
enter and to leave again without being seen. In that case there would
be explanations, and my attempt would no longer be all my own. After a
little hesitation, then, I screwed up my courage and continued upon my
way, my useless gun under my arm.
The darkness of the forest had been alarming, but even worse was the
white, still flood of moonlight in the open glade of the iguanodons.
Hid among the bushes, I looked out at it. None of the great brutes
were in sight. Perhaps the tragedy which had befallen one of them had
driven them from their feeding-ground. In the misty, silvery night I
could see no sign of any living thing. Taking courage, therefore, I
slipped rapidly across it, and among the jungle on the farther side I
picked up once again the brook which was my guide. It was a cheery
companion, gurgling and chuckling as it ran, like the dear old
trout-stream in the West Country where I have fished at night in my