CHAPTER XXVIII.
FIGHT AND ESCAPE.
Duval returned a few moments later with sandwiches and milk, which he placed upon a table at one side of the room. He drew up three chairs and motioned the other two to seats. Then, with his revolver upon the table near him, he sat down himself.
"Don't stand on ceremony," he said to Hal. "This will be your last meal on earth, so you may as well make the most of it. Pitch in."
"Thanks," replied Hal, showing no sign of fear.
He picked up a sandwich and proceeded to eat it with apparent relish.
Light now filtered through a window at the far end of the room. Duval glanced at his watch.
"Mon Dieu!" he exclaimed. "I had no idea it was so late."
"What time is it?" asked Hal calmly.
"I can't see as it makes any difference to you," said Duval, with an evil leer. "You are not going any place. However, I'll tell you. It is now just ten minutes past eight."
Hal did not reply, and proceeded to finish his sandwich.
Finally, all the food having disappeared, Duval pushed back his chair and produced three cigars, one of which he offered to Hal and the other to his lieutenant.
"I don't smoke," said Hal; "thanks all the same."
"Suit yourself," replied Duval. "However, you may as well make yourself comfortable while we enjoy our cigars."
He puffed luxuriously, as did the other.
Hal also leaned back in his chair. He chafed under this restraint, but he realized that it would be foolish to make an effort to escape under the very mouths of his two captors' guns. Nevertheless, he was ready to take advantage of the first opportunity that should offer itself.
But none came.
Duval and his lieutenant, having disposed of their cigars, arose. The former, poking the muzzle of his revolver close to Hal's head, said sharply:
"Get up, now, and walk ahead of us. No tricks!"
Hal did as ordered, and, with the Apache chief's revolver prodding him in the back, left the room. At a command he went down the stairs to the basement.
"Turn to the right," instructed Duval.
Hal obeyed. At the far end of the cellar they came to a little room.
Duval motioned Hal into it and followed himself, as did his lieutenant.
The latter now kept Hal covered, while Duval tapped the walls with the
butt of his revolver.
"Perfectly solid, you see," he said to Hal.
"I see," replied Hal.
Duval struck the open door several resounding blows.
"Also perfectly solid," he remarked. "If you had a gun now you might possibly blow the lock off, but, as you haven't, you will be safe enough."
He turned to his aide.
"You are sure he was not armed?"
"Sure. I searched him carefully."
"All right. Then there is no need to search him again."
With his revolver he covered the lad while he backed from the little room.
"Good-by," he said, and jumping out quickly, slammed the door closed.
"Good-by," Hal called after him, without a tremor.
"When the water begins to rise," shouted Duval, through the door, "you may lose some of your nerve. I'd like to stay and hear you cry for mercy, but I have other work to do. However, my friend here will stay in the house, and I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't hear you upstairs."
To this Hal made no reply.
He now turned his attention to an examination of the room in which he was confined. The walls rose on all sides to a height of perhaps fifteen feet. This he had perceived while the door stood open, but inside now it was perfectly dark, except for a tiny stream of light that filtered in from below the walls, which failed to reach the floor by less than an inch.
The lad felt the walls carefully with his hands. They were perfectly smooth. He placed his fingers on the floor. It was dry.
He stood silent for some moments and then, becoming conscious of a strange sound, he again touched the floor with his fingers. They came away wet. Water was slowly trickling into the room.
The room was very small, and Hal realized that it would not take it long to fill. Therefore he decided on instant action.
When Duval, before leaving the lad to his fate, had mentioned revolvers, Hal had feared for the moment that he might be searched anew; but, when Duval had said a second search was not necessary, the lad breathed easier. His reference to blowing away the lock had not been lost on Hal, but the lad had already thought of that.
"Well," he said to himself, "the sooner I act the better. If Duval has left the house already I shall have but one to deal with. If I wait until I am sure he has gone, I shall probably be drowned. Here goes!"
Quickly he produced his pair of automatics, and, running his hand over the door, found the lock. He placed the muzzle of one automatic right up against it, and holding the other in his other hand, ready for instant use should he encounter a foe on the opposite side, fired.
In the narrow room the shot sounded like an explosion of a cannon, and the force of it shook the lad from head to toe. Smoke filled the little aperture, strangling him. He pressed his weight against the door. It did not yield. Something had gone wrong.
Again he placed his revolver against the lock, and fired quickly twice, and then hurled his weight against the door. It gave way before him, and the lad staggered from the smoke into the damp but fresher air of the open cellar.
There, inhaling great breaths of air the while, he listened for the sound of his enemies. Not a sound was to be heard. The lad reasoned this out for himself.
"The shots were probably muffled within," he said. "I doubt if they could have been heard very far. Now to get out!"
He made his way to the end of the cellar where he had entered in the night, and finally came upon the little window. Then he gave vent to an exclamation of dismay.
"Great Scott!" he cried. "I can't reach it!"
It was true. The window was so high above the ground that there was no way in which the lad could secure so much as a finger-hold. He looked around for some object upon which to stand, but he could find none.
"Well, I'll have to go out through the house," he told himself. "There is no help for it."
Slowly and silently he climbed the steps once more, and as silently opened the door. There was light in the hall, and the boy could make out which way to go. He turned toward the room in which he had been taken prisoner and entered softly.
There, stretched out on the bed, was the Apache chief's lieutenant. Duval himself was not to be seen.
Hal, with revolver ready, tiptoed into the room. He saw a revolver on the little table, and muttered to himself:
"Careless of him."
At that moment the man on the bed turned and slowly opened his eyes. A cry of terror escaped him, as his gaze rested upon Hal, whom he was morally certain was in a living tomb in the cellar.
"Ghost, go away!" he exclaimed.
Hal laughed loudly, and it was no ghost laugh, either. The man in the bed sat up.
"How did you get out of there?" he demanded, as if it were the most momentous question in the world.
"I blew the lock off the door," replied Hal calmly.
"But your gun? You had no gun."
"Oh, yes, I had," smiled Hal. "I had two of 'em, and I've got 'em yet. See?"
He pointed both straight at the head of his late captor.
"Now," he said quietly, "get up and get out of there."
"What are you going to do with me?" asked the man in alarm.
"Deliver you into the care of General Gallieni."
The Apache lieutenant slowly moved toward the edge of the bed and Hal lowered his weapons. This act almost proved the lad's undoing.
A second revolver suddenly flashed in the hand of the man in the bed, and he cried in a stern voice:
"Hands up!"
Hal, taken absolutely by surprise, could do nothing but obey.
"You see the tables are turned again," said the man in the bed pleasantly. "You should always remember that a man may keep one of his revolvers under his pillow."
Hal was crestfallen, and he showed it plainly. However, he still held his own weapons in his upraised hands, and he had no mind to release the weapons if there was any way in which he could avoid it.
"Put those guns on the table, and be quick about it," ordered his enemy and slipped from the bed to the floor.
Hal advanced slowly toward the table, and laid down the revolver he held in his right hand. The man in the bed took a step toward him. It was the moment for which the lad had been waiting and he acted instantly.
Slowly his weapon came down, and then it suddenly flashed in the Apache's face as the lad's hand pressed the trigger.
A miss was impossible. Hal had made up his mind that he would trifle with his opponent no longer. He realized fully that his own life depended upon his getting the upper hand and that it was no time to be squeamish.
Accordingly, when the opportunity presented itself, he fired pointblank in his opponent's face. The latter threw up his hands, gave out a single loud scream of pain, and toppled backward to the floor in a heap.
Hal bent over him. "Dead," he said simply. "Now to get out of this."
He left the house and made his way with all speed toward the Hotel de Ville. But he had not gone a block when he beheld, in a little store he was passing, a scene of confusion. The lad stopped and peered in. He made out Chester's figure and, instantly realizing his danger, dashed forward.
He arrived just in time to catch an uplifted arm that would have crushed
Chester's head with a heavy wrench.