Book Of Hercules - A Legendary Quest read online

Book Of Hercules - A Legendary Quest read online Ten years of prestige "All the better to run with, child.","Grandmother, what large teeth you have!",“No, no, thank you, John. I am willing to believe that you are very strong.”,“Then I presume you ate more of them than was good for you.”,"No, no, madam!" replied the poor cook, touched to the quick, "you shall not die, and you shall see your children again, but it will be in my own house, where I have hidden them; I will again deceive the Queen-mother by serving up to her a young hind in your stead."，Ferdinand descended a large vaulted hall; he crossed it towards a low arched door, which was left half open, and through which streamed a ray of light. The door opened upon a narrow winding passage; he entered, and the light retiring, was quickly lost in the windings of the place. Still he went on. The passage grew narrower, and the frequent fragments of loose stone made it now difficult to proceed. A low door closed the avenue, resembling that by which he had entered. He opened it, and discovered a square room, from whence rose a winding stair-case, which led up the south tower of the castle. Ferdinand paused to listen; the sound of steps was ceased, and all was profoundly silent. A door on the right attracted his notice; he tried to open it, but it was fastened. He concluded, therefore, that the person, if indeed a human being it was that bore the light he had seen, had passed up the tower. After a momentary hesitation, he determined to ascend the stair-case, but its ruinous condition made this an adventure of some difficulty. The steps were decayed and broken, and the looseness of the stones rendered a footing very insecure. Impelled by an irresistible curiosity, he was undismayed, and began the ascent. He had not proceeded very far, when the stones of a step which his foot had just quitted, loosened by his weight, gave way; and dragging with them those adjoining, formed a chasm in the stair-case that terrified even Ferdinand, who was left tottering on the suspended half of the steps, in momentary expectation of falling to the bottom with the stone on which he rested. In the terror which this occasioned, he attempted to save himself by catching at a kind of beam which projected over the stairs, when the lamp dropped from his hand, and he was left in total darkness. Terror now usurped the place of every other interest, and he was utterly perplexed how to proceed. He feared to go on, lest the steps above, as infirm as those below, should yield to his weight;—to return was impracticable, for the darkness precluded the possibility of discovering a means. He determined, therefore, to remain in this situation till light should dawn through the narrow grates in the walls, and enable him to contrive some method of letting himself down to the ground.，“See that thundering big one away over there? I’m going to get her,” said Eric, pointing to a venerable looking crab that had been lying for a long time squeezed in between two rocks. The boys dangled the string with the stone on it temptingly near the big crab. Crabs usually get excited over a stone swinging above them that way. They reach up for it, grip it tightly, and—a jerk and up they come! But this crab had seen too many such stones in its long life, and lay stock still without moving a claw.，Little by little the room emptied. The colored lights shone like small suns along the dark avenues, and the stars twinkled and gleamed.Bob’s mind began to act quickly. The links of his chain of evidence against Jerry were rapidly coming together. From Ted he had learned that Wesley and Harper represented the most desperate faction of the cattlemen; they were the spokesmen of the crowd that wanted the Mexicans to do real damage to the dam. Here they were gambling with Jerry and winning from him.

“I’m sure proud of you two,” he said warmly. “But I ought not to be. It was a foolhardy thing to do and if you had asked my permission I certainly would not have given it.” But as he reproved them his eyes glistened with the pride he felt. “I want to hear all about it, but first tell me, did you find a place where you think a dam could be built? There is a wonderful valley out there ready to spring into life if we only could get water to it.”,“Mother dear, don’t you think that Bob will surely go to heaven when he dies?”,“No. I shan’t have to be taken up by a policeman ever any more.” Johnny shook his head energetically. “And I’m going to study hard. Thank you.”,“It’ll be twenty feet through at the top. At the bottom it has to be pretty nearly two hundred feet. Although it is all filled in now by masonry, they had to dig down to bedrock and to get there they had to excavate about five hundred and fifty thousand cubic yards of sand, shale and rock. It’s sixty-five feet from the river bed to the bottom of the foundation.”,For a time all went well, but soon Jerry said in a whisper—somehow the dark made him whisper rather than speak aloud—“I can’t touch the roof any more, can you?”,But at first all he could think of was what would happen if he did not get out. Probably it meant the blowing up of the dam and machinery and a serious uprising of the Mexicans—one that would mean bloodshed. It was terrible to think of, yet he was convinced that that was the least that could be expected. The cattlemen could not hold the Mexicans in check once they had been started on the rampage.,“Yes, it is like a mirror, Grandmother,” answered Tellef.,He was trapped!,“Thanks, fellows, thanks,” laughed the Chief. “It will be fine for all of us. But that’s enough of my news—what have you chaps been up to? Been bored?”,“A railroad goes to the job all right, Bob, but it’s meant for freight and a train runs only three times a week. The line was built by the Service and belongs to the Government. We’ve come the wrong day to catch that train.”,“Yes, can do,” stated the Indian, and as they had approached the upper camp during their talk, he made a swift move of the hand in farewell and slipped swiftly into the shadows.,Father and Mother sat in the study, Mother with her handkerchief in her hand and with red eyes..