opposite wall being too far distant to allow me to get any
purchase for my feet, I presently desisted. The closeness of the door
to the jambs warned me that an attempt to prise it open would be equally
futile; and for a moment I stood gazing in perplexity at the solid
planks, which bid fair to baffle me to the end.

The position was, indeed, one of great difficulty, nor can I now think
of any way out of it better or other than that which I adopted. Against
the wall near the head of the stairs I had noticed, as I came up, a
stout wooden stool. I stole out and fetched this, and setting it against
the opposite wall, endeavoured in this way to get sufficient purchase
for my feet. The lock still held; but, as I threw my whole weight on the
door, the panel against which I leaned gave way and broke inwards with
a loud, crashing sound, which echoed through the empty house, and might
almost have been beard in the street outside.

It reached the ears, at any rate, of the men sitting below, and I heard
them troop noisily out and stand in the hall, now talking loudly, and
now listening. A minute of breathless suspense followed--it seemed a
long minute; and then, to my relief, they tramped back again, and I
was free to return to my task. Another thrust, directed a little lower,
would, I hoped, do the business; but to make this the more certain I
knelt down and secured the stool firmly against the wall. As I rose
after settling it, something else, without sound or warning, rose also,
taking me completely by surprise--a man's head above the top stair,
which, as it happened, faced me. His eyes met mine, and I knew I was
discovered.

He turned and bundled downstairs again with a scared face, going so
quickly that I could not have caught him if I would, or had had the wit
to try. Of silence there was so longer need. In a few seconds the alarm
would be raised. I had small time for thought. Laying myself bodily
against the door, I heaved and pressed with all my strength; but whether
I was careless in my haste, or the cause was other, the lock did not
give. Instead the stool slipped, and I fell with a crash on the floor at
the very moment the alarm reached the men below.

I remember that the crash of my unlucky fall seemed to release all the
prisoned noises of the house. A faint scream within the room was but
a prelude, lost the next moment in the roar of dismay, the clatter of
weapons, and volley of oaths and cries and curses which, ro