"He'll find a way," my companion replied. "Never fear, Castellan is a resourceful man, and all I hope is that he'll find a way of getting us out of this hole. If we could only manage to get out of our cabins, there might be some chance for us, but so far as I can see, there is not the slightest possibility of being able to do that. What is more to the point, did you observe that they are making assurance doubly sure by putting a padlock on each cabin door?"
"No, I did not notice it," I replied. "How do you know it?"
"Because the carpenter was at work on my door before breakfast," he answered.
If this were so, our case was indeed hopeless, for while we might be able to force the lock, it would be impossible to break through both lock and staple. When we returned to the saloon, I found that what my companion had said was only too true. The man had placed the necessary fittings on each of my friends' cabin doors, and was just commencing on mine. He stood aside to let me pass, and as he did so, I noticed that behind the flap of his tool basket, and less than a couple of inches from the door, lay a small gimlet, which doubtless he had been using for the work he had been engaged upon. As I saw it, a longing to possess it, such as I never had for anything in my life, came over me. If only I could get it into the cabin unobserved, it would be worth more to me than a hundred times its weight in gold. Was it possible, however, to secure it? I had only a second in which to hit upon a scheme, but that was sufficient. Putting my hand to my waistcoat, I gave a tug at the cord which carried my eye-glass. It snapped and the glass rolled away across the floor towards the spot where the man was standing. He stooped to pick it up, but before he had time to stand upright again, I had given the gimlet a push with my foot, and it was inside the cabin. When the man returned the glass to me, I gave him a coin for his trouble, thanked him, and then walked into my cabin and shut the door. Once that was closed behind me, I picked up my treasure and thrust it under the mattress of my bunk. The question the next few minutes would have to decide was whether the loss would be discovered, and if so, whether the man would accuse me of taking it. So invaluable would it be to me, that I felt as though I would have fought the world for its possession. I could plainly hear him driving in the last screws, and afterwards placing the tools he had been using in his basket with the others. A moment later the padlock was placed on the door and locked, and then my hearing told me that he was leaving the saloon. When all was safe, I took the gimlet from its hiding-place once more, and regarded it with an interest that, I can assure you, no article of that description had ever inspired in me before. Now, if only it were not discovered that I had it in my possession, I felt that I should be able to make my escape from the cabin when the proper time arrived.
When we went on deck after luncheon, I informed the Commander-in-Chief of my good fortune, and of the use I intended putting it to. His delight was as sincere as my own, and we were about to discuss the possibilities it opened up for us, when I felt compelled to take off the yachting cap Reiffenburg had lent me on the morning after my arrival on board. Hitherto it had been tolerably comfortable, now it did not fit at all. A nasty lump was pressing upon my forehead, and in order to discover what occasioned it, I lifted the strip of leather inside, to find a piece of paper there that had certainly not been in the cap when I had last worn it. One second's consideration was sufficient to convince me that this was Castellan's method of conveying a message to me. He must have worn my cap when on deck, and have placed the strip of paper in a place where he knew I should be well-nigh certain to find it.
Leaning on the taffrail, with our backs turned to the sentry, I opened it and eagerly scanned the contents. It ran as follows:—
"Dear Manderville,—Your letter astounded me. The plot you speak of only serves to show what a set of fiends we have fallen in with. Since receiving it, I have been puzzling my brains for a solution of the difficulty, but so far have discovered no plan that could have the remotest prospect of success. As you will by this time have noticed, our enemies have taken double precautions to ensure our remaining prisoners. Unless we can manage to force our way out at the last moment, I fear that our fate is sealed. Should any idea occur to either of us, I will communicate with you again by the same means that I have employed on this occasion. God bless you both, and may He help us in our trouble.—Your friend,
B. C."
When we had read it I tore it into small pieces and threw the fragments overboard. Half an hour later, when we went below, I wrote him a brief note in which I told him to be of good cheer, for I thought I had hit upon a scheme which might very possibly prove successful. This, when next we were on deck together, I placed in the hat, and on the following morning had the satisfaction of finding it gone.
Try, if you can, to imagine with what feelings we greeted the dawn of the day that was to mean so much for us. Who knew what the end of it would be? The mere idea was quite bad enough, but the uncertainty as to when the event we dreaded would take place was much worse. It might not be until towards evening, or it might be at any moment. I was well aware that to carry out the plan I had proposed to myself—namely, the boring holes with the gimlet round the lock and the hasp and staple that secured the padlock, would take a long time, and, if left until the last moment, would be useless. On the other hand, for all our sakes, I dared not begin the work while there was even the remotest chance of our enemies discovering it. I was not afraid of their looking behind the door, for the simple reason that when I was out of the cabin, it was invariably hitched back, by means of a brass catch, to the end of the bunk—and there would be no reason for them to examine it. Yet if the point of the gimlet should chance to penetrate the smooth surface round the lock on the other side, detection would be certain, and the plot would fail by reason of it. Therefore, when we returned from our morning spell on deck, I embraced a momentary opportunity that presented itself, and measured the exact thickness of the door. Then when the latter was closed upon me and I was alone, I was able to mark the gimlet to correspond. Having allowed a sufficient margin to ensure the point not going quite through the door, I mapped out my plan of operations, and set to work. The gimlet was not a large one, nor was its point particularly sharp. The labour was therefore prodigious; the tiny box-handle cut and blistered my hand, my face streamed with perspiration, but still I worked on and on, remembering always that not only my own life, but the lives of my companions, depended upon my exertions. By mid-day more than three-parts of the work was accomplished. As a memento of the occasion, large blisters covered the palm of my hand, while every muscle of my arm ached as if I had been placed upon the rack. That no suspicions should be aroused, I removed every particle of sawdust from the floor, and dropped it out of the port-hole, to be carried away by the breeze. By the time I was summoned to the luncheon only some twenty holes remained, and these I resolved to complete as soon as we returned from our airing on deck.
During the progress of the meal, it was easily to be seen that something unusual was going on. Our guards were unmistakably excited, and I will do the older man, Sargasta, the credit of saying that he appeared sufficiently alive to his own villainy to have no desire for conversation with either the Commander-in-Chief or myself. Conrad, on the other hand, was even more flippant than usual. I noticed also that both men watched the deck uneasily, as though they were momentarily expecting news from that quarter. If this were so, they were destined to be disappointed, for the meal ended as uneventfully as it had begun.