“And it’s damp, too,” mused Tom. “It has held water! Ah, I have it—the old cistern under the first shop we built!”
When the Swift Construction Company was first started it was in a modest way, with only a small shop. Beneath this Mr. Swift had had built a large cistern for the storage of rain water, which, because of its softness, or non-chemical quality, was needed in his experiments. Later, when the business grew and the little old shop was abandoned, the cistern was emptied and closed, a larger storage tank being built in another place.
Entrance to the abandoned cistern could be gained by a trap door in the floor of the shop, but as Tom remembered there was no ladder in the reservoir.
“Barsky must have lowered me in here with a rope,” thought Tom. “Then he simply dropped the cover on and ran away. It was clever of him. Now he has time to work some of his plans, I suppose. This is all a deep-laid plot, and it’s been in the making some time. I wish I had taken dad’s advice and never hired that fellow! However, it’s too late to think about that now! I must get myself out of here and stop him—that is, if it isn’t too late!”
Tom managed to squirm to a sitting position. This made him feel better, but it sent the blood again rushing into his sore head, and for a moment or two he felt dizzy and sick. This passed, however, and he began to reason matters out.
“I could shout my lungs out,” reasoned Tom, “and no one would hear me. But, wait! I remember something. The tunnel! It’s all right! I can get out if I can free myself!”
With the further clearing of his brain it occurred to Tom that some years before he and his father had dug a tunnel, leading from a distant hillside into the cistern. The tunnel passed beneath the foundations of the old shop and the passage was used to conduct some experiments in the action of air currents. Aeroplane models, as one knows, are tested in what is called a wind tunnel, and the Swift underground tunnel was one of the first of these ever made. It had not been used for a long time, however, and the end, opening under the hill, had been boarded up.
“But if I can get loose I can walk along the tunnel and I guess I can manage to kick down those boards,” thought Tom. “However, the question is, can I get loose?”
At first it seemed that this must be answered in the negative. So firmly had Barsky made the bonds that Tom tugged and strained for some time, to his no small discomfort, without any effect.
At last, however, he felt the ropes around his hands, which had been tied behind his back, giving a little. This encouraged him, and, gritting his teeth to keep back involuntary exclamations of pain, he strained harder. It was out of his power to break them, but the ropes stretched a little, and at last, after hard work, he managed to get his hands free.