Having accomplished that, he dragged me through into the passage, where the agony ceased as instantly as the ache does when a dentist pulls an abscessed tooth.

No one sound reached us through the open door.

However immature that particular branch of their science might be, they had learned the way of absolutely localizing noise.
The Gray Mahatma came out smiling, and ignoring me as if I was not there.
He opened another door, not requiring to knock this time, and led the way along another passage that wound through solid rock for what can hardly have been less than a quarter of a mile.
King had dragged me out of that dome of dins in the nick of time, and my head was recovering rapidly.

By the time we reached a door at the end of that long passage I could think clearly, and although too weak to stand upright without holding on to something, was sufficiently recovered to know that the remainder would be only a matter of minutes.

And we spent three or four of the minutes waiting for the door to open, which it did at last suddenly.
A man appeared in the opening, whose absolutely white hair reached below his shoulder-blades, and whose equally white beard descended to his middle.