But the strangest thing of all was that with all this look of hidden power there was no sound, and no drop of water overflowed the hollow basin.  The ground we stood on was a slab of solid rock and dry as bone,—­no splash, no sound, no drop outside,—­only the silent and powerful up-thrust of the water from below, the silent golden rings that tumbled to the sides of the basin, and the constant expectation of something more which never came.

It was Carette’s quick understanding that named it.

“It is like Krok,” she whispered, and the word was said.  It was all as like Krok—­not the outside man, but the inner Krok, dumb and powerful, silently doing his appointed work—­as anything that could be imagined.

“Yes,” I said.  “It is like Krok.  It is very wonderful—­running like that all through, the ages—­since the cave was made anyway—­very wonderful.”

She stooped to dip her hand and taste it, and then drew back.

“It looks as if it would bite,” she said, and I took off the lid of the can and scooped up a draught and drank it.

“The sweetest water I ever tasted, and cold as ice.  It is as good as the water at La Tour.”

Then she drank also, and then she washed out the milk-can, but would not pour the dirty water back into the basin.  “It would be an offence,” she said simply, and I felt the same.

Then we left our can there and went on along the cleft, which grew narrower and narrower till we could only go singly.  And so we came at last into a sound of waters in front, and going cautiously, found ourselves in a somewhat wider place, with dull waves tumbling hollowly at our feet.

Carette crept to my side, and I held the lantern up and out, but we could see only a rough, black-arched roof and ragged rock walls, and a welter of black waves which broke sullenly against the shelving path on which we stood, as though driven in there against their will.

“This is the water-cave Uncle George spoke of, but I don’t see any light.”

“Perhaps it’s night outside,” said Carette in a whisper.  “Let us get back, Phil.  I don’t like this place.  The waves look as if they were dead.”

So we went back the way we had come, and she pressed still closer to me as we passed the little hollow in which the spring churned on, noiseless, and ceaseless, and untiring, and seemed to look up at us with a knowing eye as our lantern set the yellow gleams writhing and twisting in it.  We watched it for a time, it looked so like breaking into sound every next moment.  But no sound came, and we picked up our can and went on.

“I do wish I knew if it is to-day or to-morrow,” said Carette.

“Without doubt it is to-day.”

“I don’t believe it, Phil.  It’s either to-morrow or the day after, or the day after that.”

“But that milk would never have kept sweet.”

“It would keep sweet a very long time here.  The air is so fresh and cool.”