es, he recalled something which seemed so much a part
of his sleep that he had not been sure that he had not dreamed it. The
ringing sound! He sprang up on his feet with a little gasping shout.
The ringing sound! It had been the ring of metal, striking as it fell.
Anything made of metal might have sounded like that. She had thrown
something made of metal into the cellar. She had thrown it through the
slit in the bricks near the door. She liked him, and said he was too
good for his prison. She had thrown to him the only thing which could
set him free. She had thrown him the KEY of the cellar!

For a few minutes the feelings which surged through him were so full of
strong excitement that they set his brain in a whirl. He knew what his
father would say--that would not do. If he was to think, he must hold
himself still and not let even joy overcome him. The key was in the
black little cellar, and he must find it in the dark. Even the woman
who liked him enough to give him a chance of freedom knew that she must
not open the door and let him out. There must be a delay. He would
have to find the key himself, and it would be sure to take time. The
chances were that they would be at a safe enough distance before he
could get out.

"I will kneel down and crawl on my hands and knees," he said.

"I will crawl back and forth and go over every inch of the floor with
my hands until I find it. If I go over every inch, I shall find it."

So he kneeled down and began to crawl, and the cat watched him and
purred.

"We shall get out, Puss-cat," he said to her. "I told you we should."

He crawled from the door to the wall at the side of the shelves, and
then he crawled back again. The key might be quite a small one, and it
was necessary that he should pass his hands over every inch, as he had
said. The difficulty was to be sure, in the darkness, that he did not
miss an inch. Sometimes he was not sure enough, and then he went over
the ground again. He crawled backward and forward, and he crawled
forward and backward. He crawled crosswise and lengthwise, he crawled
diagonally, and he crawled round and round. But he did not find the
key. If he had had only a little light, but he had none. He was so
absorbed in his search that he did not know he had been engaged in it
for several hours, and that it was the middle of the night. But at
last he realized that he must stop for a rest, because his knees were
beginning