44/53 Ten steps downward, and the vision is gone. The green cloud has closed again over your head, and you are stumbling in the darkness of the bush, half blinded by the sudden change from the blaze to the shade. 'Take care of the Croc-chien!' shouts your companion: and you are aware of, not a foot from your face, a long, green, curved whip, armed with pairs of barbs some four inches apart; and are aware also, at the same moment, that another has seized you by the arm, another by the knees, and that you must back out, unless you are willing to part with your clothes first, and your flesh afterwards. You back out, and find that you have walked into the tips--luckily only into the tips--of the fern-like fronds of a trailing and climbing palm such as you see in the Botanic Gardens. |