CHAPTER XV.
THE END.
What remains to be told is of little public interest. When we came to ourselves, all was darkness. Escape seemed impossible.
We could not swarm up the rope, by the way we had come.
We knew not when the shaft of yellow light might return on its beat.
We lit a Bryant & May's match, and thereby groped our way downwards, ever downwards.
Finally, as we had given up all for lost, Leonora said, 'Don't you think the air is a little stuffy?'
We sniffed about the rocky floor, and found an iron grating.
It yielded to a strong tug, and we descended into subterranean passages, framed by the art of men, through which rolled and surged torrents of turbid water.
Through these we waded, attacked by armies of rats, till, thank goodness! we saw a moving light, flashing hither and thither on the torrent.