I was in a paralysis of terror. Outside there were excited voices and

incredulous oaths. The trunks were being jerked around in a frantic

search, the windows were thrown open, only to show a sheer drop of

forty feet. And the man in the room with me leaned against the

mantel-door and listened. His pursuers were plainly baffled: I heard

him draw a long breath, and turn to grope his way through the

blackness. Then--he touched my hand, cold, clammy, death-like.

A hand in an empty room! He drew in his breath, the sharp intaking of

horror that fills lungs suddenly collapsed. Beyond jerking his hand

away instantly, he made no movement. I think absolute terror had him

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by the throat. Then he stepped back, without turning, retreating foot

by foot from The Dread in the corner, and I do not think he breathed.

Then, with the relief of space between us, I screamed, ear-splittingly,

madly, and they heard me outside.

"In the chimney!" I shrieked. "Behind the mantel! The mantel!"

With an oath the figure hurled itself across the room at me, and I

screamed again. In his blind fury he had missed me; I heard him strike

the wall. That one time I eluded him; I was across the room, and I had

got the chair. He stood for a second, listening, then--he made another

rush, and I struck out with my weapon. I think it stunned him, for I

had a second's respite when I could hear him breathing, and some one

shouted outside: "We--Can't--get--in. How--does--it--open?"

But the man in the room had changed his tactics. I knew he was

creeping on me, inch by inch, and I could not tell from where. And

then--he caught me. He held his hand over my mouth, and I bit him. I

was helpless, strangling,--and some one was trying to break in the

mantel from outside. It began to yield somewhere, for a thin wedge of

yellowish light was reflected on the opposite wall. When he saw that,

my assailant dropped me with a curse; then--the opposite wall swung

open noiselessly, closed again without a sound, and I was alone. The

intruder was gone.

"In the next room!" I called wildly. "The next room!" But the sound

of blows on the mantel drowned my voice. By the time I had made them

understand, a couple of minutes had elapsed. The pursuit was taken up

then, by all except Alex, who was determined to liberate me. When I

stepped out into the trunk-room, a free woman again, I could hear the

chase far below.

I must say, for all Alex's anxiety to set me free, he paid little

enough attention to my plight. He jumped through the opening into the

secret room, and picked up the portable safe.

"I am going to put this in Mr. Halsey's room, Miss Innes," he said,

"and I shall send one of the detectives to guard it."




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