Part 5 (1/2)

”Maybe it's _ourr_ boys, hey?” Archer asked excitedly.

Tom did not answer immediately. He was thrilled at this thought of his own country speaking so that he, poor fugitive that he was, could hear it in this dark, lonesome dungeon in a hostile land, across all those miles.

”Maybe,” he said, his voice catching the least bit. ”They're in the Toul sector. A feller in prison told me. You don't feel so lonesome, kind of, when you hear that----”

”Gee, I hope we can get to them,” said Archer.

”What you _got_ to do, you can do,” Tom answered. ”I wonder----”

”Sh-h. D'you hearr that?” Archer whispered, clutching Tom's shoulder.

”It was much nearerr--right close----”

They held their breaths as the reverberation of a sharp report died away.

”What was it?” Archer asked tensely.

”I don't know,” Tom whispered, instinctively removing the short stick and closing the trap door tight. ”Don't move--hus.h.!.+”

CHAPTER VI

PRISONERS AGAIN

”Do you hear footsteps?” Archer breathed.

Tom listened, keen and alert. ”No,” he said at last. ”There's no one coming.”

”What do you s'pose it was?”

”I don't know. Sit down and don't get excited.”

But Tom was trembling himself, and it was not until five or ten minutes had pa.s.sed without sound or happening that he was able to get a grip on himself.

”Push up the door a little and listen,” suggested Archer.

Tom cautiously pressed upward, but the door did not budge. ”It's stuck,”

he whispered.

Archer rose and together they pressed, but save for a little looseness the door did not move.

”It's caught outside, I guess,” said Tom. ”Maybe the iron hasp fell into the padlock when I put it down, huh?”

That, indeed, seemed to be the case, for upon pressure the door gave a little at the corners, but not midway along the side where the fastening was. Archer turned cold at the thought of their predicament, and for a moment even Tom's rather dull imagination pictured the ghastly fate made possible by imprisonment in this black hole.

”There's no use getting excited,” he said. ”We get some air through the cracks and after dark she'll be here, like she said. It's beginning to get dark now, I guess.”