CHAPTER NINE HOW THEY DISCOVERED SOMETHING WORTH KNOWING（第3/3页）

After that all happened quickly. There was a wild cry，a swishing，dusty，gravelly noise，a rattle of stones，and Jill found herself sliding，sliding，hopelessly sliding，and sliding quicker every moment down a slope that grew steeper every moment. It was not a smooth，firm slope，but a slope of small stones and rubbish. Even if you could have stood up，it would have been no use. Any bit of that slope you had put your foot on would have slid away from under you and carried you down with it. But Jill was more lying than standing. And the farther they all slid，the more they disturbed all the stones and earth，so that the general downward rush of everything（including themselves）got faster and louder and dustier and dirtier. From the sharp cries and swearing of the other two，Jill got the idea that many of the stones which she was dislodging were hitting Scrubb and Puddleglum pretty hard. And now she was going at a furious rate and felt sure she would be broken to bits at the bottom.

Yet somehow they weren’t. They were a mass of bruises，and the wet，sticky stuff on her face appeared to be blood. And such a mass of loose earth，shingle，and larger stones was piled up round her（and partly over her）that she couldn’t get up. The darkness was so complete that it made no difference at all whether you had your eyes open or shut. There was no noise. And that was the very worst moment Jill had ever known in her life. Supposing she was alone：supposing the others...Then she heard movements around her. And presently all three，in shaken voices，were explaining that none of them seemed to have any broken bones.

“We can never get up that again,”said Scrubb’s voice.

“And have you noticed how warm it is ？”said the voice of Puddleglum. “That means we’re a long way down. Might be nearly a mile.”

No one said anything. Some time later Puddleglum added：

“My tinder-box has gone.”

After another long pause Jill said，“I’m terribly thirsty.”

No one suggested doing anything. There was so obviously nothing to be done. For the moment，they did not feel it quite so badly as one might have expected；that was because they were so tired.

Long，long afterwards，without the slightest warning， an utterly strange voice spoke. They knew at once that it was not the one voice in the whole world for which each had secretly been hoping；the voice of Aslan. It was a dark，flat voice—almost，if you know what that means，a pitch-black voice. It said：

“What make you here，creatures of the Overworld ？”