Schoolmaster appeared at the
opening of the trap. The Chouette could not repress an exclamation of
horror at the sight of his ghastly, seamed, mutilated, and fearful face,
with eyes that gleamed like phosphorus, and seemed to glare on the
ground even in the midst of the darkness which the lighted taper could
not entirely dissipate. Having subdued her feeling of fright, the old
hag exclaimed, in a tone of horrible flattery:

"You must be an awful man, _fourline_, for even I was frightened!--yes,
I!"

"Quick, quick, for the Allee des Veuves!" said the ruffian, securely
closing the double flap of the trap with a bar of iron. "In another
hour, perhaps, it will be too late. If it is a trap, it is not yet
baited; if it is not, why, we can do the job alone."

CHAPTER XV.

THE VAULT.

Stunned by his horrible fall, Rodolph lay senseless and motionless at
the bottom of the stairs, down which he had been hurled. The
Schoolmaster, dragging him to the entrance of a second and still deeper
cavern, thrust him into its hideous recesses, and closing and securely
bolting a massy iron-shod door, returned to his worthy confederate, the
Chouette, who was waiting to join him in the proposed robbery (it might
be murder) in the Allee des Veuves.

About the end of an hour Rodolph began, though slowly, to resume his
consciousness. He found himself extended on the ground, in the midst of
thick darkness; he extended his hand and touched the stone stairs
descending to the vault; a sensation of extreme cold about his feet
induced him to endeavour, by feeling the ground, to ascertain the cause:
his fingers dabbled in a pool of water.

With a violent effort he contrived to seat himself on the lower step of
the staircase; the giddiness arising from his fall subsided by degrees,
and as he became able to extend his limbs he found, to his great joy,
that, though severely shaken and contused, no bones were broken. He
listened: the only sound that reached his ear was a low, dull,
pattering, but continued noise, of which he was then far from divining
the cause.

As his senses became more clear, so did the circumstances, to which he
had been the unfortunate victim, return to his imagination; and just as
he had recalled each particular, and was deeply considering the possible
result of the whole, he became aware that his feet were wholly submerged
in water; it had, indeed, risen above his ankle.

In the midst of the heavy gloom and deep si