then
closed with a brick and mortar wall.

The mantel fascinated me. Made of wood and carved, the more I looked
the more I wondered that I had not noticed before the absurdity of such
a mantel in such a place. It was covered with scrolls and panels, and
finally, by the merest accident, I pushed one of the panels to the
side. It moved easily, revealing a small brass knob.

It is not necessary to detail the fluctuations of hope and despair, and
not a little fear of what lay beyond, with which I twisted and turned
the knob. It moved, but nothing seemed to happen, and then I
discovered the trouble. I pushed the knob vigorously to one side, and
the whole mantel swung loose from the wall almost a foot, revealing a
cavernous space beyond.

I took a long breath, closed the door from the trunk-room into the
hall--thank Heaven, I did not lock it--and pulling the mantel-door wide
open, I stepped into the chimney-room. I had time to get a hazy view
of a small portable safe, a common wooden table and a chair--then the
mantel door swung to, and clicked behind me. I stood quite still for a
moment, in the darkness, unable to comprehend what had happened. Then
I turned and beat furiously at the door with my fists. It was closed
and locked again, and my fingers in the darkness slid over a smooth
wooden surface without a sign of a knob.

I was furiously angry--at myself, at the mantel door, at everything. I
did not fear suffocation; before the thought had come to me I had
already seen a gleam of light from the two small ventilating pipes in
the roof. They supplied air, but nothing else. The room itself was
shrouded in blackness.

I sat down in the stiff-backed chair and tried to remember how many
days one could live without food and water. When that grew monotonous
and rather painful, I got up and, according to the time-honored rule
for people shut in unknown and ink-black prisons, I felt my way
around--it was small enough, goodness knows. I felt nothing but a
splintery surface of boards, and in endeavoring to get back to the
chair, something struck me full in the face, and fell with the noise of
a thousand explosions to the ground. When I had gathered up my nerves
again, I found it had been the bulb of a swinging electric light, and
that had it not been for the accident, I might have starved to death in
an illuminated sepulcher.

I must have dozed off. I am sure I did not faint. I was never more
composed in my li