He got down to the ground and began to examine the cellar windows. They

seemed to be fitted with iron bars set into the solid masonry. He went

all around the house and found each one unshakable, until he reached

the last at the back. There he found a bit of stone cracked and

loosened and it gave him an idea. He set to work with his few tools,

and finally succeeded in loosening one rusted bar. He was much hindered

in his work by the necessity of keeping a constant watch out, and by

his attempts to be quiet. There was no telling when Link and Shorty

might come to feed their captive and he must not be discovered.

It was slow work picking away at the stone, filing away at the rusty

iron, but the bars were so close together that three must be removed

before he could hope to crawl through, and even then he might be able

to get no further than the cellar. The guy that fixed this house up for

a prison knew what he was about.

Faintly across the mountains came the echo of bells, or were they in

the boy's own soul? He worked away in the hot sun, the perspiration

rolling down his weary dirty face, and sometimes his soul fainted

within him. Bells, and the sweet quiet church with the pleasant daily

faces about and the hum of Sunday School beginning! How far away that

all seemed to him now as he filed and picked, and sweated, and kept up

a strange something in his soul half yearning, half fierce dread, that

might have been like praying only the burden of its yearning seemed to

be expressed in but a single word, "Mark! Mark!"

At last the third bar came loose and with a great sigh that was almost

like a sob, the boy tore it out, and cleared the way. Then carefully

gathering his effects, tools, milk bottle and cap together, he let them

down into the dungeon-like blackness of the cellar, and crept in after

them, taking the precaution to set up in place the iron bars once more

and leave no trace of his entrance.

Pausing cautiously to listen he ventured to strike a match, mentally

belaboring himself at the wasteful way in which he had always used his

flash light which was now so much needed and out of commission. The

cellar was large, running under the whole house, with heavy rafters and

looming coal pits. A scurrying rat started a few lumps of coal in the

slide, and a cobwebby rope hung ominously from one cross beam, giving

him a passing shudder. It seemed as if the spirit of the past had

arisen to challenge his entrance thus. He took a few steps forward

toward a dim staircase he sighted at the farther end, and then a sudden

noise sent his heart beating fast. He extinguished the match and stood

in the darkness listening with straining ears. That was surely a step

he heard on the floor above!




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