It smelt appetizing.
We wriggled into the tunnel side by side, until our heads were well under
the mattress-roof. We could see out under the huddled, crumpled canvas.
Full in our limited view lay, in the middle of the camp street, a fat
Nucerian, the outline of his big chest and prominent paunch dimly visible
in the increasing light. His gurgling snores were plainly audible.
Agathemer broke off two fragments of the bread and we munched
ruminatively.
We had hardly swallowed three mouthfuls when Agathemer exclaimed:
"Just in time! I can hear the arrows already! Listen!"
We listened. I could hear a sound as of hail on roofs. And, just above us,
I could hear the arrows plunge into our protecting mound with a swishing,
rending thud.
"We ought to be safe," Agathemer whispered. "But we may get skewered even
as we are. Volleyed arrows drive deep."
I heard many a volley and, after the first, since I was listening for it,
I heard faintly before each volley the deep boom of thousands of powerful
bows, twanging all at the same instant.
As the light increased I could see the drunken Nucerian with his hummocky
outline emphasized by five feathered arrows planted in his body. He must
have been killed by any of the five.
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