These, alone, of the several things he saw, interested
him. Ghek sat down upon the bench and waited in silence,
listening. Presently the lights were extinguished. If Ghek could
have smiled he would have then, for Ghek could see as well in the
dark as in the light--better, perhaps. He watched the dark
openings of the holes in the floor and waited. Presently he
detected a change in the air about him--it grew heavy with a
strange odor, and once again might Ghek have smiled, could he
have smiled.
Let them replace all the air in the chamber with their most
deadly fumes; it would be all the same to Ghek, the kaldane, who,
having no lungs, required no air. With the rykor it might be
different. Deprived of air it would die; but if only a sufficient
amount of the gas was introduced to stupefy an ordinary creature
it would have no effect upon the rykor, who had no objective mind
to overcome. So long as the excess of carbon dioxide in the blood
was not sufficient to prevent heart action, the rykor would
suffer only a diminution of vitality; but would still respond to
the exciting agency of the kaldane's brain.
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