I answered, “So is mine; and I can add to your reasons two at least which you have not mentioned. The one is that while within the tunnel you have lost the disability of the blindness which had hindered us in the surrounding area; the other, which is more serious (because I suppose that we could quickly reach the woods where you would presumably see as before) is that, after this delay, it is doubtful whether we could cross the hills before the night falls, and now that my last remnants of clothing have left me, my body is ill-adapted to meet either storm or frost, and I have less fear of the more even temperature of the subterranean places. “It is true that this passage is not like the one which I first penetrated. Its slope is less. Its current of upward air is less evident. Its floor is less easy to tread. Its roof does not give the same measure of light. It may not be frequently used, and it may lack the stores of food and water on which I subsisted. But beyond this, all is conjecture. It is a choice of risks, and we agree as to the one to be chosen.” So we rose, and went down together. CHAPTER VI THE DOWNWARD PATH I have often speculated as to what might have happened had we decided differently, and had I survived the dangers of the surface world, and attempted the penetration of one of the seaward tunnels. Knowing what I do now, I suppose that it must have ended fatally for myself, if not for my companion also. But so much is still mystery, so much conjecture, that even that may not be certainly true. As it was, we went on for some time in an eventless silence, the dark green shadowy smoothness of the surface on which we trod sloping gently downward, the glassy arch above us becoming gloomier as we left the daylight. The idea oppressed me that we were actually traversing a wave’s interior cavity. I think that I had been mentally exhausted by the prolonged effort of conveying the scene through which we had passed to my companion’s mind. Once or twice I tried to establish connection with her, but her thoughts were closed against me, and I gained no more than a knowledge that she was abstracted and troubled, and indisposed for conversing. Then we came to a place where we must needs pause and consult, for the straight path ceased. The slope ceased. We stood on a level path that curved forward, right and left, with a blank wall before us. Either side we might turn, and the choice could scarcely be made in silence. I questioned my companion with thought and eyes. It was too dark for me to see hers, but mine may have been visible to her better sight. She answered readily.