He took a second step down.
The candles stayed bright.
A third step. The fourth. There were only about a dozen steps in all, and he took two more, stopping in the middle. Each step was perhaps a foot in width, so he was six feet from Fezzik, six feet from the large, ornate green-handled door that opened onto the final level. “Fezzik?”
From the upper door: “What?”
“I’m frightened.”
“It looks all right though.”
“No. It’s supposed to; that’s to fool us. Whatever we’ve gotten by before, this must be worse.”
“But there’s nothing to see, Inigo.”
Inigo nodded. “That’s why I’m so frightened.” He took another step down toward the final, ornate green-handled door. Another. Four steps to go. Four feet to go.
Forty-eight inches from death.
Inigo took another step. He was trembling now; almost out of control.
“Why are you shaking?” Fezzik from the top.
“Death is here. Death is here.” He took another step down.
Twenty-four inches to dying.
“Can I come join you now?”
Inigo shook his head. “No point in your dying too.”
“But it’s empty.”
“No. Death is here.” Now he was out of control. “If I could see it, I could fight it.”
Fezzik didn’t know what to do.
“I’m Inigo Montoya the Wizard; come for me!” He turned around and around, sword ready, studying the brightly lit staircase.
“Now you’re scaring me,” Fezzik said, and he let the door close behind him and started down the stairs.
Inigo started up after him, saying “No.” They met on the sixth step.
Seventy-two inches from death now.
The green speckled recluse doesn’t destroy as quickly as the stonefish. And many think the mamba brings more suffering, what with the ulcerating and all. But gram for gram, nothing in the universe comes close to the green speckled recluse; among other spiders, compared with the green speckled recluse, the black widow was a rag doll. Prince Humperdinck’s recluse lived behind the ornate green handle on the bottom door. She rarely moved, unless the handle turned. Then she struck like lightning.
On the sixth stair, Fezzik put his arm around Inigo’s shoulder. “We’ll go down together, step by step. There’s nothing here, Inigo.”
To the fifth step. “There has to be.”
“Why?”
“Because the Prince is a fiend. And Rugen is his twin in misery. And this is their masterpiece.” They moved to the fourth step.
“That’s wonderful thinking, Inigo,” Fezzik said, loud and calmly; but, inside, he was starting to go to pieces. Because here he was, in this nice bright place, and his one friend in all the world was cracking from the strain. And if you were Fezzik, and you hadn’t much brain power, and you found yourself four stories underground in a Zoo of Death looking for a man in black that you really didn’t think was down there, and the only friend you had in all the world was going quickly mad, what did you do?
Three steps now.
If you were Fezzik, you panicked, because if Inigo went mad, that meant the leader of this whole expedition was you, and if you were Fezzik, you knew the last thing in the world you could ever be was a leader. So Fezzik did what he always did in a panic situation.
He bolted.
He just yelled and jumped for the door and slammed it open with his body, never even bothering with the niceties of turning that pretty green handle, and as the door gave behind his strength he kept right on running until he came to the giant cage and there, inside and still, lay the man in black. Fezzik stopped then, relieved greatly, because seeing that silent body meant one thing: Inigo was right, and if Inigo was right, he couldn’t be crazy, and if he wasn’t crazy, then Fezzik didn’t have to lead anybody anywhere. And when that thought reached his brain, Fezzik smiled.