Juve was about to reply, when suddenly with a dry click the light went out.
Fandor, at the same moment, gave a startled cry: "Juve! the door is fastened; we are shut in!"
With one bound Juve leaped for the window; but after opening the casement he perceived that thick iron shutters, padlocked, banished all hope of escape in that quarter. Fandor was ashy pale; Juve staggered as he moved toward him.
"Walled in!" he cried. "We are walled in!"
But a new terror suddenly confronted the two men. The floor appeared to be giving way, and as the descent proceeded regularly, they realised that they were in a strange form of elevator.
The study, however, did not drop very far. With a slight shock it reached the end of the run and stopped short.
Juve cried with an air of relief, "Well, here we are, and it now remains to find out where we are."
The existence of two studies identical in every particular, one of which was housed in an elevator, explained not only the events of the evening, but also the tragedy of two days before.
"Juve! did you feel anything?"
"Yes."