Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-05-26
BY ROBERT BARR.
Copyright 1905. by Robert Barr All right. reserved

shuff1ed slowly forward with hands out
| stretched but he came to the wall. and not
| to the bench Again he mapped out MS
| route, again endeavored and again faiIed
This is bewildering," he muttered. How
| the darkness battles a man. For the nrst
| time in my life l appreciate to the fuii the
| benedction of Gods command, Let there De
light" "
| He stood perpIexed for a few moments,
| and, deeply thinking, his hands au'omau-
| cally performed operation as the serN-
ants of habit They took from ms poehe.
| his cigarette case, selected tube or To-
bacco. placed 1t between his lips, searched
another pocket brought out matchbox
| and struck a light. The striking or the
match startled Lermontoff as If 1t had peen
an explosion; then he laughed, holdlng the
match above his head and there at his feet
saw the loaf of black bread. 1t seemed as
I If somebody had twisted the room END LOT
end The door where ne thought the
stream was and thus he learned That SOUND
gives no indication of direction to a man
blndfolded. The match began to wane, ana
feverishly he lit his cigarette.
"Why didn't / think of the matches, ana
oh, what pity I failed to fill my pockets
with them that night of the professors din
ner partyi To think that matches are sen
ing at this moment in Sweden two hundreo
and fifty for halfpenny?'
Guided by the spark at the end OF ms Gig
arctic. he sought the bench and sat down
upon It, He was surprised to find h1mseIi
SO little depressed as was actually the case
He did not feel in the least dishearteneu-
Something was going to happen on ms pc
half; of that he was quite certain. II was
perfectly ridiculous that even in Russia a
| loyal subject who had never done any IL
| legal act in his life, nobleman of the en-
pre and a friend of the car, should be IN
carcerated for long without trial, and even
without accuse ton. He had no enemies
that he knew of and many friends, and yet
| he experienced a vague uneaS1neSS Wnen ne
remembered that his own course of life had
hoe, rrb hat he
his friends. For more than a year he had
been in England, at sea, and In America so
much absorbed in his researches that he
had written no private letters worth speak
| ing of, and if any friend were asked MS
wherea bouts he was likely to reply:
"Oh, Lermontoff is in some German univer-
sity town or in England or travelling else
where. ! haven't seen him or heard or MN
for months Lost in a wilderness or IN an
experiment, perhaps.
These unhappy meditations We're inter-
rupted by the clang of bolts. He thought
at first it was his own door that was beng
opened but a moment later knew it was
the door of the next cell upstream. The
sound, of course, could not penetrate the
extremely thick wall, but came through the
aperture whose roof arched the water
course From the voices he estimated that
several prisoners were being put into one
CELL and he wondered whether or not he
cared for a companion 1t would all de-
pend If fellow-prisoners hated each other,
their enforced proximity might prove I'M
pleasant.
I'VE are hungry he heard one say.
Bring food.
The gaoler laughed.
II will give you something to drink first"
That's right" three voices shouted.
Vodka, vodkai
Then the door changed shut again and he
heard the murmur of voices in Russian, but
could not make out what was said. One OF
the new prisoners, cropping round. appeared
to have struck the stone bench. as he
himself had done. The man in the next
cell swore coarsely. and Lermontoff. judg-
ing from such snat ches of their CONVERSE
ton as he could hear that they were per-
sons of low order, felt no desire to make
their more intimate acquaintance. and SO
did not shout to them as he had intended
to do. And now he missed something that
had become familiar; thought 1t was a Gig
arctic he desired, for the one he had lit
had been smoked to his very lips, then he
recognized it was the murmur of the
stream that had ceased.
"Ah. they can shut 1t off, he said.
That's interesting. l must investigate, and
learn whether or no there Is communication
between the cells. Not very likely, though
He crawled on hands and knees until he
came to the bed of the stream, which was
now damp but empty. Kneeling down In it's
course, he worked his way toward the
lower cell, and as he expected, came to
stout iron bars. Crouchng thus he sacri-
feed a second match and estimated that
the distance between the two cells was as
much as ten feet OF solid rock, and saw
also that behind the perpendicular iron
bars were another horizontal set, then
other perpendicular, then q fourth hori-
zontal
While in this position he was startled by
a piercing scream to the rear. He backed
out from the tunnel and stood upright once
more He heard the sound of people
splashng round In water The screamer
began to jabber like maniac, punctuating
his rawlings with shrieks. Another was
cursing vehemently, and third appealing
to the saints. Lermontoff quickly knelt
down IN the watercourse. this time facing
the upper cell and struck his third match.
He saw that Il steel shield, reminding him
of the thin shutter between the lenses of
a camera, had been shot across the tun-
mel behind the second group of cross bars,
and as an engineer he could not but admire
the skill of the practical expert who had
constructed this diabolical device, for in
spite of the pressure on the other side,
hardly a drop of water ooZed through He
tried to reach this shield, but could not.
1t was just beyond the touch of his fingers
with his arm through the two sets of bars,
but IL he could nave stretched that far,
with the first bar retarding his shoulder,
he knew his hand would be helpless even
IL he had some weapon to puncture the
steel shield. The men would be drowned
before he could accomplish anything I'M
less he was at the lever in the passage out
side.
Crawling into his cell again he heard no
more of the chatter and cries of the ma
mac and he surmised that the other two
We're fighting for places on bench shelf,
which was amply large enough to have
supported BOTH had they not been too de-
mented with fear to recognize that fact.
The cursing man was victorious and now
he stood alone on the shelf, roaring male
dictions Then there was the sound of a
plunge and Lermontof, standing there,
helpless and shiverlng, heard the prisoner
swim round and round his cell like fu-
rious animal. muttering and swearing.
Don't exhaust yourself like that" shout
ed Lermontoff.s ''If you want to live, cling
to the hole at either of the two upper cor
ners. The water can't rise above you then,
and you can breathe till it subsidies"
The other either did not hear, or did not
heed but tore round and round In his con-
fined tank thrashing the water like a dy-
ing whale.
Pool devil" moaned Jack. Whats the
use of telling him what to do He is DOOM
ed in any case. The other two are now
better of"
A moment later the water began to drib-
BILE through the upper aperture into Jacks
cell increasing and increasing until there
was the roar of waterfall, and he felt
the cold splashing drops squirt against him.
Beyond this there was silence. 1t was per-
haps ten minutes after that the lever was
pulled and the water belched forth from
the lower tunnel like a mill race broken
loose temporarily nooding the floor so that
Jack was compelled to sand on the bench.
He sunk down shivering on the stone