f
she had an intimate knowledge of the surroundings.

She was running at top speed. Halfway down the length of the shed she
tripped and fell over some object. She pushed it aside as she rose. It
was an old iron casting, more bulky in shape than in weight, though
she found it none too light to lift comfortably. She ran on. A wharf
projected out, she found, from this end of the shed. At the edge, she
peered over. It was quite light here again; away from the protecting
shadows of the shed, the rays of the arc lamp played without hindrance
on the wharf just as they did on the shed's side door. Below, some
ten or twelve feet below, and at the corner of the wharf, a boat, or,
rather, a sort of scow, for it was larger than a boat though oars lay
along its thwarts, was moored. It was partly decked over, and she could
see a small black opening into the forward end of it, though the opening
itself was almost hidden by a heap of tarpaulin, or sailcloth, or
something of the kind, that lay in the bottom of the craft. She nodded
her head. They might all of them use that boat to advantage!

Rhoda Gray turned and ran back. The Sparrow, with a grunt of
satisfaction, was just opening the door. She stepped through the
doorway. The Sparrow followed.

"Close it!" said Rhoda Gray, under her breath. She felt her heart beat
quicken, the blood flood her face and then recede. Her imagination had
suddenly become too horribly vivid. Suppose they--they had already gone
farther than...

With an effort she controlled herself--and the round, white ray of her
flashlight swept the place. A moment more, and, with a low cry, she
was running forward to where, on the floor near the wall of the shed
opposite the side door, she made out the motionless form of a man. She
reached him, and dropped on her knees beside him. It was the Adventurer.
She spoke to him. He did not answer. And then she remembered what
Danglar had said, and she saw that he was gagged. But--but she was not
sure that was the reason why he did not answer. The flashlight in her
hand wavered unsteadily as it played over him. Perhaps the whiteness of
the ray itself exaggerated it, but his face held a deathly pallor;
his eyes were closed; and his hands and feet were twisted cruelly and
tightly bound.

"Give me your knife--quick--Sparrow!" she called. "Then go and keep
watch just outside."

The Sparrow handed her his knife, and hurried back to the door.

She worked in the darkness now. S