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11 - The Island of Dr Moreau - H G Wells · Science Fiction Books

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  Speaker 1: Eleven, The Hunting of the Man. It came before my
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  Speaker 1: mind with an unreasonable hope of escape, that the outer
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  Speaker 1: door of my room was still open to me. I
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  Speaker 1: was convinced, now, absolutely assured, that Moreau had been vivisecting
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  Speaker 1: a human being. All the time since I had heard
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  Speaker 1: his name, I had been trying to link in my
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  Speaker 1: mind in some way the grotesque animalism of the Islanders
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  Speaker 1: with his abominations, and now I thought I saw it all.
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  Speaker 1: The memory of his work on the transfusion of blood
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  Speaker 1: recurred to me. These creatures I had seen were the
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  Speaker 1: victims of some hideous experiment. These sickening scoundrels had merely
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  Speaker 1: intended to keep me back, to fool me with their
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  Speaker 1: display of confidence, and presently to fall upon me with
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  Speaker 1: a fate more horrible than death, with torture, and after torture,
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  Speaker 1: the most hideous degradation it is possible to conceive, to
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  Speaker 1: send me off a lost soul, a beast, to the
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  Speaker 1: rest of their comus route. I looked around for some weapon, nothing,
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  Speaker 1: Then with an inspiration, I turned over the deck chair,
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  Speaker 1: put my foot on the side of it, and tore
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  Speaker 1: away the side rail. It happened that a nail came
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  Speaker 1: away with the wood and projecting gave a touch of
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  Speaker 1: danger to an otherwise petty weapon. I heard a step outside,
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  Speaker 1: and incontinently flung open the door and found Montgomery within
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  Speaker 1: a yard of it. He meant to lock the outer door.
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  Speaker 1: I raised this nailed stick of mine and cut at
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  Speaker 1: his face, but he sprang back. I hesitated a moment,
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  Speaker 1: then turned and fled round the corner of the house
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  Speaker 1: prindic man. I heard his astonished cry, don't be a
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  Speaker 1: thiliath man. Another minute, thought I, and he would have
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  Speaker 1: had me locked in and as ready as a hospital
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  Speaker 1: rabbit for my feet. He emerged behind the corner for
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  Speaker 1: I heard him shout prynd dick. Then he began to
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  Speaker 1: run after me, shouting things as he ran, this time
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  Speaker 1: running blindly. I went northeastward in the direction at right
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  Speaker 1: angles to my previous expedition. Once, as I went running
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  Speaker 1: headlong up the beach, I glanced over my shoulder and
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  Speaker 1: saw his attendant with him. I ran furiously up the
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  Speaker 1: slope over it, then turning eastward along a rocky valley
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  Speaker 1: fringed on either side with jungle, I ran for perhaps
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  Speaker 1: a mile altogether my chest, straining my heart beating in
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  Speaker 1: my ears, and then, hearing nothing of Montgomery or his man,
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  Speaker 1: and feeling upon the verge of exhaustion, I doubled sharply
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  Speaker 1: back towards the beach as I judged, and lay down
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  Speaker 1: in the shelter of a cane brake. There I remained
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  Speaker 1: for a long time, too fearful to move, and indeed
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  Speaker 1: too fearful even to plan a course of action. The
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  Speaker 1: wild scene about me lay sleeping silently under the sun,
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  Speaker 1: and the only sound near me was the thin hum
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  Speaker 1: of some small gnats that had discovered me. Presently I
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  Speaker 1: became aware of a drowsy breathing sound, the sowing of
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  Speaker 1: the sea upon the beach. After about an hour I
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  Speaker 1: heard Montgomery shouting my name far away to the north.
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  Speaker 1: That set me thinking of my plan of action as
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  Speaker 1: I interpreted it. Then this island was inhabited only by
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  Speaker 1: these two vivisectors and their animal lies victims. Some of these,
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  Speaker 1: no doubt they could press into their service against me
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  Speaker 1: if need arose. I knew both Moreau and Montgomery carried revolvers,
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  Speaker 1: and save for a feeble bar of deal spiked with
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  Speaker 1: a small nail, the merest mockery of a mace. I
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  Speaker 1: was unarmed, so I lay still there until I began
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  Speaker 1: to think of food and drink. And at that thought
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  Speaker 1: the real hopelessness of my situation came home to me.
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  Speaker 1: I knew no way of getting anything to eat. I
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  Speaker 1: was too ignorant of botany to discover any resort of
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  Speaker 1: root or fruit that might lie about me. I had
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  Speaker 1: no means of trapping the few rabbits upon the island.
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  Speaker 1: It grew blanker the more I turned the prospect over.
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  Speaker 1: At last, in the desperation of my position, my mind
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  Speaker 1: turned to the animal men I had encountered. I tried
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  Speaker 1: to find some hope in what I remembered of them.
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  Speaker 1: In turn, I recalled each one I had seen, and
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  Speaker 1: tried to draw some augury of assistance from my memory.
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  Speaker 1: Then suddenly I heard a stag hound bay, and at
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  Speaker 1: that realized a new danger. I took little time to think,
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  Speaker 1: or they would have caught me then, but, snatching up
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  Speaker 1: my nailed stick, rushed headlong from my hiding place towards
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  Speaker 1: the sound of the sea. I remember a growth of
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  Speaker 1: thorny plants with spines that stabbed like pin knives. I
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  Speaker 1: emerged bleeding and with torn clothes, upon the lip of
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  Speaker 1: a long creek opening northward, I went straight into the
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  Speaker 1: water without a minute's hesitation, wading up the creek and
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  Speaker 1: presently finding myself knee deep in a little stream, I
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  Speaker 1: scrambled out at last on the westward bank, and with
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  Speaker 1: my heart beating loudly in my ears, crept into a
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  Speaker 1: tangle of ferns to await the issue. I heard the
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  Speaker 1: dog there was only one draw nearer, and yelp when
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  Speaker 1: it came to the thorns. Then I heard no more,
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  Speaker 1: and presently began to think I had escaped. The minutes passed,
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  Speaker 1: the silence lengthened out, and at last, after an hour
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  Speaker 1: of security, my courage began to return to me. By
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  Speaker 1: this time I was no longer very much terrified or
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  Speaker 1: very miserable. I had, as it were, past the limit
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  Speaker 1: of terror and despair. I felt now that my life
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  Speaker 1: was practically lost, and that persuasion made me capable of
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  Speaker 1: daring anything. I had even a certain wish to encounter
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  Speaker 1: mo Row face to face. And as I had waded
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  Speaker 1: into the water, I remembered that if I were too
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  Speaker 1: hard pressed, at least one path of a skin from
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  Speaker 1: torment still lay open to me. They could not very
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  Speaker 1: well prevent my drowning myself. I had half a mind
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  Speaker 1: to drown myself then, but not wished to see the
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  Speaker 1: whole adventure out. A queer impersonal spectacular interest in myself
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  Speaker 1: restrained me. I stretched my limbs, sore and painful from
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  Speaker 1: the pricks of the spiny plants, and stared around me
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  Speaker 1: at the trees, and so suddenly that it seemed to
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  Speaker 1: jump out of the green tracery about it. My eyes
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  Speaker 1: lit upon a black face watching me. I saw that
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  Speaker 1: it was the Simian creature who had met the launch
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  Speaker 1: upon the beach. He was clinging to the oblique stem
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  Speaker 1: of a palm tree. I gripped my stick and stood
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  Speaker 1: up facing him. He began chattering, you, you, You was
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  Speaker 1: all I could distinguish at first. Suddenly he dropped from
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  Speaker 1: the tree, and in another moment was holding the fronds
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  Speaker 1: apart and staring curiously at me. I did not feel
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  Speaker 1: the same repugnance towards this creature which I had experienced
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  Speaker 1: in my encounters with the other beast men. You, he
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  Speaker 1: said in the boat. He was a man, then, at
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  Speaker 1: least as much of a man as Montgomery's attendant, for
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  Speaker 1: he could talk. Yes, I said, I came in the
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  Speaker 1: boat from the ship. Oh, he said, And his bright,
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  Speaker 1: restless eyes traveled over me, to my hands, to the
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  Speaker 1: stick I carried, to my feet, to the tattered places
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  Speaker 1: in my coat, and the cuts and scratches I had
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  Speaker 1: received from the thorns. He seemed puzzled at something. His
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  Speaker 1: eyes came back to my hands. He held out his
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  Speaker 1: own hand and counted his digits slowly, one, two, three, four, five. Ay.
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  Speaker 1: I did not grasp his meaning. Then, afterwards I was
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  Speaker 1: to find that a great proportion of these beast men
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  Speaker 1: had malformed hands, lacking sometimes even three digits. But, guessing
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  Speaker 1: this was in some way a greeting, I did the
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  Speaker 1: same thing by way of reply. He grinned with immense satisfaction.
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  Speaker 1: Then his swift, roving glance went round again. He made
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  Speaker 1: a swift movement and vanished. The fern Franz he had
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  Speaker 1: stood between came swishing together. I pushed out of the
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  Speaker 1: break after him, and was astonished to find him swinging
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  Speaker 1: cheerfully by one lanka from a rope of creepers that
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  Speaker 1: looped down from the foliage overhead. His back was to
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  Speaker 1: me hullo, said I. He came down with a twisting
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  Speaker 1: jump and stood facing me. I say, said I, where
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  Speaker 1: can I get something to eat? Eat? He said, eat
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  Speaker 1: man's food now, and his eye went back to the
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  Speaker 1: swing of ropes at the huts. But where are the huts? Oh,
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  Speaker 1: I'm new, you know? At that, he swung round and
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  Speaker 1: set off at a quick walk. All his motions were
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  Speaker 1: curiously rapid. Come along, said he. I went with him
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  Speaker 1: to see the adventure out. I guessed the huts were
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  Speaker 1: some rough shelter where he and some more of these
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  Speaker 1: beast people lived. I might perhaps find them friendly, find
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  Speaker 1: some handle in their minds to take hold of. I
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  Speaker 1: did not know how far they had forgotten their human heritage.
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  Speaker 1: My ape like companion trotted along by my side, with
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  Speaker 1: his hands hanging down and his jaw thrust forward. I
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  Speaker 1: wondered what memory he might have in him. How long
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  Speaker 1: have you been on this island? Said I? How long?
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  Speaker 1: He asked, and after having the question repeated, he held
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  Speaker 1: up three fingers. The creature was little better than an idiot.
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  Speaker 1: I tried to make out what he meant by that,
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  Speaker 1: and it seems I bored him. After another question or two,
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  Speaker 1: he suddenly left my side and went leaping at some
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  Speaker 1: fruit that hung from a tree. He pulled down a
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  Speaker 1: handful of prickly husks and went on eating the contents.
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  Speaker 1: I noted this with satisfaction, for here, at least was
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  Speaker 1: a hint for feeding. I tried him with some other questions,
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  Speaker 1: but his chattering prompt responses were, as often as not,
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  Speaker 1: quite at cross purposes with my question. Some few were appropriate,
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  Speaker 1: others quite parrot like. I was so intent upon these
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  Speaker 1: peculiarities that I scarcely noticed the path we followed. Presently
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  Speaker 1: we came to trees all charred and brown, and so
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  Speaker 1: to a bare place covered with a yellow white incrustation,
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  Speaker 1: across which a drifting smoke, pungent in wiffs to nose
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  Speaker 1: and eyes. When drifting on our right over a shoulder
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  Speaker 1: of bare rock, I saw the level blue of the sea.
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  Speaker 1: The path coiled down abruptly into a narrow ravine between
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  Speaker 1: two tumbled and knotty masses of blackish scory eye. Into
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  Speaker 1: this we plunged. It was extremely dark this passage. After
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  Speaker 1: the blinding sunlight reflected from the sulfurous ground, Its walls
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  Speaker 1: grew steep and approached each other blotches of green and
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  Speaker 1: crimson drifted across my eyes. My conductor stopped suddenly, home,
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  Speaker 1: said he. And I stood in a floor of a
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  Speaker 1: chasm that was at first absolutely dark to me. I
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  Speaker 1: heard some strange noises and thrust the knuckles of my
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  Speaker 1: left hand into my eyes. I became aware of a
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  Speaker 1: disagreeable odor, like that of a monkey's cage. Ill cleaned
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  Speaker 1: beyond the rock opened again upon a gradual slope of
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  Speaker 1: sunlit greenery, and on either hand the lights smote down
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  Speaker 1: through narrow ways into the central gloom.