There was a scratch and a splutter, and the match flared bravely. Its yellow rays illumined a cellar very much like any other cellar. It was walled with stonework, well cemented, and there were two or three small windows at the sides. But these, which at first filled Roy with a flush of hope, proved, on examination, to have been bricked up, and solidly, too.
"Nothing doing there," he muttered, and turned his attention to the rear of the underground place where there was a flight of steps leading up to a horizontal door, which, evidently, opened on the outerworld. But this door was secured on the under side by a rusty padlock of formidable dimensions. Roy tried it. It was solid as the Rock of Gibraltar, as the advertisements say.
"Stuck!" he muttered disappointedly; and yet: "Hold on! What about that pocket tool kit I had when I started out on the auto? Hooray! Those chaps forgot to search me. Thought it was too much trouble, I guess. Now for a sharp file! Good! here's one! Now, then, if the luck holds, I'll be free in not much more than a long jiffy!"
These thoughts shot through Roy's brain, as he selected a file from his fortunate find, and began working away at the hasp of the padlock. Above him he could hear the low grumbling growl of the voices of his guardians. But they came very faintly.
"Lucky thing they are in the front room," thought Roy, as he worked on, "otherwise, they might hear this."
At last the file had cut far enough into the hasp for Roy's strong fingers to be able to bend the metal apart. With a beating heart, he replaced the little tool in its case and pulled the ring of the padlock out of the hasp. Then he gave an upward shove, but very gently. For all he knew, the door he was pushing upward might open in another room. But when it gaped, an inch only, Roy saw the faint radiance of a clouded moon. A gust of fresh, clean air blew in his face, as if welcoming him from his noisome depths. An instant later, with throbbing pulses and flushed cheeks, Roy stood out in the open. Above him light clouds raced across the moon, alternately obscuring and revealing the luminary of the night.
But Roy didn't linger. He crept across the field, keeping close to a tall, dark hedge-row till he reached the automobile. As he had guessed, neither of his captors knew how to run it, and it stood just where he had left it.
"Glory be!" thought the boy, climbing in, "I'm all right, now. I don't know where this road goes to, and it's too narrow to turn round, but I'll keep straight on and I'm bound to land somewhere."
He turned on the gasoline and set the spark. But the engine didn't move.
"Queer," thought Roy.