pretended thrusts, hoping thus to create and prolong an agony of fear
and suspense.

A more viciously cruel and vindictive creature never drew the breath of
life.

She laughed again, and slowly pressed the weapon closer--and then, with
a sudden startled cry, she drew back and leaped to her feet.

A noise like that of a mighty cannonade seemed to shake even the solid
walls of this buried chamber.

It was the crash of thunder in the heavens overhead.

It was Cervera's first intimation of the terrible tempest that had been
gathering outside.

At first she thought the sound was that of revolvers, and she darted to
the door and listened, pressing her ear to the wall.

The instant her back was turned, Nick made a desperate attempt to free
himself, straining cords and muscles under the determined effort. It
proved vain, however. The ropes held him as if made of twisted steel.

Yet in his brief but desperate struggle his right arm came in contact
with an object in the side pocket of his sack coat.

The object was a box nearly filled with parlor matches--one of the most
dangerous and treacherous creations of man's inventive genius.

Like a sudden revelation, or a bolt out of the blue, there leaped up in
Nick's mind a possible way of escape.

He thought of Cervera's garments, of the fluffy lace skirts beneath her
gown, to which a single flash of fire would instantly prove fatal.

The resort to such means seemed horrible--yet Nick well knew it was the
one and only resource left him.

He glanced sharply at Cervera. She was still listening at the door, with
her evil face a picture of intense suspense.

With a quick turn of his wrist, Nick succeeded in extracting the box
from his pocket. Then he forced it open, and with a move of his hand he
scattered its entire contents over the floor around his chair. The tiny
matches fell with scarce a sound, and Cervera, ten feet away, failed to
hear them.

Then Nick quietly worked his chair back a foot or two, in order to bring
some of the fateful things upon the floor directly in front of him.

A moment later Cervera turned from the door.

"Thunder--it was thunder," she muttered, under her breath. "There's a
storm outside."

"Somebody coming?" queried Nick, with taunting accents.

He now aimed to provoke her, to force the situation to a climax, lest
any mischance should have befallen Chick, or perverted in any way his
own designs upon Kilgore and the gang. His taunting