“There is one comfort, however,” he muttered. “Heaven is to be thanked for that!”
He took the revolver from his pocket as he muttered the words; all of its chambers were loaded, and he put it back into his pocket with a slight chuckle of satisfaction.
“I guess they didn’t count on that. They have got me in here, but it’ll be another thing to get me out!”
There was but very little idea of sleep left in his mind. When at last he had decided that there was no solving the mystery with the few facts that he knew, he began stealthily moving about the room and examining everything in it.
Directly at the head of the bed he found a handsome portiere hanging, and as he reached behind this he discovered that there was another door to the apartment.
“Perhaps they haven’t locked that,” he thought. “I wonder where it leads to?”
He slipped in behind the curtain and proceeded to test that door also. He set about the matter with the utmost caution, for by this time he was firmly convinced that it was more than likely that someone was keeping watch outside of his room.
The prisoner had really very little idea of finding the door unlocked; he did not think it likely that his captors would have neglected that precaution, and he was thoroughly prepared to spend the rest of the night in his prison. Such being the case, his surprise and delight may be imagined when, upon turning the knob and pushing softly, he found the door giving way before him.
His heart was thumping with excitement as he made this discovery, and inch by inch he opened the barrier wider. He could see nothing, for the curtain back of him shut out the light from his own room and the next apartment appeared absolutely dark. However, when it was opened wide enough for him to slip in, Roberts stole cautiously forward, and was soon standing on the floor of the other room. All about him was absolutely dark and silent, but he groped around him for some distance before he finally concluded to go back and get a little light.
From a notebook in his pocket he tore several pages, which served him for a small taper; and by this he made the discovery with consternation that the apartment into which he had come was a tiny cell, not more than fifteen feet square. There was a square window, high up from the ground and heavily barred. By the faint light which he had Roberts saw that the walls of the place were all stone, and that the door through which he had come was composed of iron!