Bearing against the mirror, after a short silence, he said: "It takes some time to release the counterbalance, when you press on
the spring from the inside of the room. It is different when you are
behind the wall and can act directly on the counterbalance. Then the
mirror turns at once and is moved with incredible rapidity."
"What counterbalance?" asked Raoul.
"Why, the counterbalance that lifts the whole of this wall on to its
pivot. You surely don't expect it to move of itself, by enchantment!
If you watch, you will see the mirror first rise an inch or two and
then shift an inch or two from left to right. It will then be on a
pivot and will swing round."
"It's not turning!" said Raoul impatiently.
"Oh, wait! You have time enough to be impatient, sir! The mechanism
has obviously become rusty, or else the spring isn't working... Unless
it is something else," added the Persian, anxiously.
"What?"
"He may simply have cut the cord of the counterbalance and blocked the
whole apparatus."
"Why should he? He does not know that we are coming this way!"
"I dare say he suspects it, for he knows that I understand the system."
"It's not turning! ... And Christine, sir, Christine?"
The Persian said coldly: "We shall do all that it is humanly possible to do! ... But he may stop
us at the first step! ... He commands the walls, the doors and the
trapdoors. In my country, he was known by a name which means the
'trap-door lover.'"
"But why do these walls obey him alone? He did not build them!"
"Yes, sir, that is just what he did!"
Raoul looked at him in amazement; but the Persian made a sign to him to
be silent and pointed to the glass ... There was a sort of shivering
reflection. Their image was troubled as in a rippling sheet of water
and then all became stationary again.
"You see, sir, that it is not turning! Let us take another road!"
"To-night, there is no other!" declared the Persian, in a singularly
mournful voice. "And now, look out! And be ready to fire."
He himself raised his pistol opposite the glass. Raoul imitated his
movement. With his free arm, the Persian drew the young man to his
chest and, suddenly, the mirror turned, in a blinding daze of
cross-lights: it turned like one of those revolving doors which have
lately been fixed to the entrances of most restaurants, it turned,
carrying Raoul and the Persian with it and suddenly hurling them from
the full light into the deepest darkness.