bridge was tangled and half, submerged, bobbing and canting and rearing
as it fought its retaining cables like an unbroken horse on a tether.
From Taita's pool'a roaring river of water was boring down the far
branch of the tunnel across the sink-hole.
The tunnel was flooding rapidly, the water already reaching halfway up
the walls, but he knew that it was the only escape route from the tomb.
Every moment he delayed, the flood became stronger.
'I have to get out through there.' He pushed himself to his feet again.
He reached the first pontoon of the bridge, but it was careering about
so madly that he dared not attempt to remain upright upon it. He dropped
to his hands and knees, crawled out on to the flimsy structure and
managed to drag himself forward from one pontoon to the next, 'Please
God and St. Michael help me. Don't let me die like this,' he prayed
aloud. He reached the far side of the sink'hole and groped for a
handhold on the roughly hewn walls of the tunnel.
He found a hold with his fingertips and pulled himself into the mouth of
the tunnel, but now the full force of the water pouring down the shaft
struck his lower body. He hung there for a moment, pinned by the raging
waters, unable to move a pace forward. He knew that if his grip failed
he would be swept back into the sink-hole and sucked down into those
terrible black depths.
The electric bulbs strung along the roof of the tunnel ahead of him
still burned brightly, so that he could see almost to the open basin of
Taita's pool where the bamboo -scaffolding would offer escape to the top
of the chasm. It was only two hundred feet ahead of him. He gathered all
his strength and pulled himself forward against the raging waters,
reaching forward from one precarious handhold to
the next. His fingernails tore and the flesh smeared from the tips of
his fingers on the jagged rock, but he forced his way onwards.
At last he could see daylight ahead of him, filtering from Taita's pool.
Only another forty feet to go, and he realized with a surge of relief
and joy that he was going to make it out of the deadly trap of the
shaft. Then he heard a fresh sound, a harsher, more brutal roar as the
full flood of the burst dam poured down the waterfall into Taita's pool.
It found the entrance to the tunnel and came down it in a solid wave,
filling the passageway to the roof, ripping out the wiring of the lights
and plunging Hansith into darkness.
It struck him with such force that it seemed to be not mere water but
the solid rock of an avalanche, and he could not resist it. It tore him
from his insecure perch and plucked him away, tossing him backwards,
spinning him down the length of the shaft that he had gained with so
much effort, and hurling him into the sink-hole beyond.
He was swirled end over end by the crazed waters. In the darkness and
wild confusion he did not know which direction was up and which down,
but it made no difference for he could not swim against its power, Then
the sink'hole seized him full in its grip and sucked him swiftly and
deeply down. The pressure of the water began to crush him. One of his
eardrums burst, and as he opened his mouth to scream at the agony of it
the water spurted down his throat and flooded his lungs. The last thing
