o
choice. At all events, after putting out the light, he leaned toward the
edge of the hole, reached it, and managed to scramble in by bending
himself in two.

Weber, Mazeroux, and their men were coming along. Don Luis propped
himself against the back of his hiding-hole to avoid as far as possible
the glare of the lanterns, of which he was beginning to see the gleams.
And an amazing thing happened: the stone against which he was pushing
toppled over slowly, as though moving on a pivot, and he fell backward
into a second cavity situated behind it.

He quickly drew his legs after him and the stone swung back as slowly as
before, not, however, without sending down a quantity of small stones,
crumbling from the wall and half covering his legs.

"Well, well!" he chuckled. "Can Providence be siding with virtue and
righteousness?"

He heard Mazeroux's voice saying:

"Nobody! And here's the end of the passage. Unless he ran away as we
came--look, through the trapdoor at the top of this ladder."

Weber replied:

"Considering the slope by which we've come, it's certain that the
trapdoor is on a level with the second floor. Well, the other little
cross ought to mark the boudoir on the second floor, next to Don Luis's
bedroom. That's what I supposed, and why I posted three of our men there.
If he's tried to get out on that side, he's caught."

"We've only got to knock," said Mazeroux. "Our men will find the trapdoor
and let us out. If not, we will break it down."

More blows echoed down the passage. Fifteen or twenty minutes after, the
trapdoor gave way, and other voices now mingled with Weber's and
Mazeroux's.

During this time, Don Luis examined his domain and perceived how
extremely small it was. The most that he could do was to sit in it. It
was a gallery, or, rather, a sort of gut, a yard and a half long and
ending in an orifice, narrower still, heaped up with bricks. The walls,
besides, were formed of bricks, some of which were lacking; and the
building-stones which these should have kept in place crumbled at the
least touch. The ground was strewn with them.

"By Jove!" thought Lupin, "I must not wriggle about too much, or I shall
risk being buried alive! A pleasant prospect!"

Not only this, but the fear of making a noise kept him motionless. As a
matter of fact, he was close to two rooms occupied by the detectives,
first the boudoir and then the study, for the boudoir, as he knew, was
over that part of his s