If I tried for a year I could not make you understand what a relief it was to me to stand upright. I stretched myself again and again, and then crossed the room on tip-toe in the dark to where the Marquis lay.
"You are free," he whispered, clutching and shaking my hand. "Oh, thank God!"
"Hush! Put down your head and let me get to work upon your collar before you say anything more."
As I was able this time to get at my work standing up, it was not very long before Beckenham was as free as I was. He rose to his feet with a great sigh of relief, and we shook hands warmly in the dark.
"Now," I said, leading him towards the door, "we will make our escape, and I pity the man who attempts to stop us."
CHAPTER IX
DR. NIKOLA PERMITS US A FREE PASSAGE
The old saying, "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched," is as good a warning as any I know. For if we had not been so completely occupied filing through the staples of our collars we should not have omitted to take into consideration the fact that, even when we should have removed the chains that bound us, we would still be prisoners in the room. I'm very much afraid, however, even had we remembered this point, we should only have considered it of minor importance and one to be easily overcome. As it was, the unwelcome fact remained that the door was locked, and, what was worse, that the lock itself had, for security's sake, been placed on the outside, so that there was no chance of our being able to pick it, even had our accomplishments lain in that direction.
"Try the window," whispered Beckenham, in answer to the heavy sigh which followed my last discovery.