It was not a great distance for a man to jump—six or seven feet at the outside; but the fugitive had not taken into consideration the ice-rimmed stonework.
Even as he leapt, Klostivitch's feet slipped from under him. With a shriek of horror he grasped vainly at the thin air, then, turning a complete somersault, crashed upon the paving-stones sixty feet below.
CHAPTER XXVIII
Rescued
"There's someone coming, sir!" whispered Chalmers, raising his revolver. "Stand by, sir!"
Both men waited in eager silence as the sound of bolts being withdrawn was borne to their ears.
A voice hailed in Russian. Fordyce lowered his pistol.
"It's all right, Chalmers," he said quietly, as Captain-Lieutenant Orloff entered the cellar.
"We have made a clean sweep of this little nest, Monsieur Fordyce!" declared the Russian. "Klostivitch will not trouble you or anyone else in the future, as far as this world is concerned. The other man you mentioned is a prisoner. We also found a third—Platoff by name. Do you know anything of him?"
No, Fordyce did not. He would have been considerably surprised if he had known that Platoff was in Mindiggle's house at Otherport on that momentous day when the Sub strove to placate the irate victim of Flirt's attack.