d
him draw a long breath, and turn to grope his way through the
blackness. Then--he touched my hand, cold, clammy, death-like.

A hand in an empty room! He drew in his breath, the sharp intaking of
horror that fills lungs suddenly collapsed. Beyond jerking his hand
away instantly, he made no movement. I think absolute terror had him
by the throat. Then he stepped back, without turning, retreating foot
by foot from The Dread in the corner, and I do not think he breathed.

Then, with the relief of space between us, I screamed, ear-splittingly,
madly, and they heard me outside.

"In the chimney!" I shrieked. "Behind the mantel! The mantel!"

With an oath the figure hurled itself across the room at me, and I
screamed again. In his blind fury he had missed me; I heard him strike
the wall. That one time I eluded him; I was across the room, and I had
got the chair. He stood for a second, listening, then--he made another
rush, and I struck out with my weapon. I think it stunned him, for I
had a second's respite when I could hear him breathing, and some one
shouted outside:

"We--Can't--get--in. How--does--it--open?"

But the man in the room had changed his tactics. I knew he was
creeping on me, inch by inch, and I could not tell from where. And
then--he caught me. He held his hand over my mouth, and I bit him. I
was helpless, strangling,--and some one was trying to break in the
mantel from outside. It began to yield somewhere, for a thin wedge of
yellowish light was reflected on the opposite wall. When he saw that,
my assailant dropped me with a curse; then--the opposite wall swung
open noiselessly, closed again without a sound, and I was alone. The
intruder was gone.

"In the next room!" I called wildly. "The next room!" But the sound
of blows on the mantel drowned my voice. By the time I had made them
understand, a couple of minutes had elapsed. The pursuit was taken up
then, by all except Alex, who was determined to liberate me. When I
stepped out into the trunk-room, a free woman again, I could hear the
chase far below.

I must say, for all Alex's anxiety to set me free, he paid little
enough attention to my plight. He jumped through the opening into the
secret room, and picked up the portable safe.

"I am going to put this in Mr. Halsey's room, Miss Innes," he said,
"and I shall send one of the detectives to guard it."

I hardly heard him. I wanted to laugh and cry in the same breath--t