Some one gave a few brief directions in French. The men picked Dan up, bearing him through a door, into a long, dark hallway, down which they carried him until they reached a door at the end. Opening the door, they threw the Battleship Boy in bodily, slamming and locking the door.
"I've made a mess of it," groaned the lad, "but I'll beat them yet."
CHAPTER X
OUTWITTED BY A BOY
The room was quite dark, except for the light that came in through an open skylight above Dan Davis' head. A glance about him told the boy that he had been thrown into a storeroom. All about him were boxes, cases and trunks.
"It will do me no good to shout. If I do, I'll give them the satisfaction of knowing that I'm done for. No; I won't yell. My men could not hear me if I did."
Dan pondered for a few moments, and an idea came to him.
"I believe I could batter that door down," he mused. "I'll take a look at it."
A brief examination convinced him that such an attempt would be foolish. The door was constructed of heavy plank, and had been made to withstand assaults. The room in which he had been made a prisoner was a place where sailors' chests were stored, a sort of safe deposit vault. There were no windows on either side, only the skylight in the ceiling, some twelve feet above the boy's head.