Manchurian Books

Then with Huldricksson manipulating our small sail, and Larry at the
rudder, we rounded the titanic wall that swept down into the depths,
and turned at last into the canal that Throckmartin, on his map, had
marked as that which, running between frowning Nan-Tauach and its
satellite islet, Tau, led straight to the gate of the place of ancient
mysteries.
And as we entered that channel we were enveloped by a silence; a
silence so intense, so--weighted that it seemed to have substance; an
alien silence that clung and stifled and still stood aloof from
us--the living. It was a stillness, such as might follow the long
tramping of millions into the grave; it was--paradoxical as it may
be--filled with the withdrawal of life.
Standing down in the chambered depths of the Great Pyramid I had known
something of such silence--but never such intensity as this. Larry
felt it and I saw him look at me askance. If Olaf, sitting in the bow,
felt it, too, he gave no sign; his blue eyes, with again the glint of
ice within them, watched the channel before us.


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