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Page 43
"All right," said she.
Down went the trap-door, and the light and the old woman disappeared
together. Max wished he had asked for a candle, although he doubted
whether his request would have been complied with.
And at the end of another five minutes, which seemed like hours, he
began to have other and graver doubts. He had gone back to his former
place near the door, and he stood waiting, with more and more eagerness,
more and more anxiety, for the promised appearance of Mrs. Higgs.
Surely, slow as her steps might be, she could have got down by this
time.
He grew restless, uneasy. The old suspicions--which her appearance and
the artful simplicity of her manner had allayed--rose up in his mind
with fresh vigor. And, to add to his anxiety, he suddenly remembered the
pretext Carrie had given to try to get him into the front room.
She had told him there were things of hers in there which she wanted. He
had believed her, at least, implicitly. But now he knew that her pretext
was a lie. She also, therefore, had been an accomplice in the plot to
get him into this room.
As this thought came into his mind, he heard again the creaking of the
boards, and this time it was accompanied by another sound, faint,
intermittent, but unmistakable--the sound of the splashing of water
close to his feet.
Turning quickly to the door, he raised his fist and brought it upon the
boards with a sounding crash; at the same time he shouted for "Help!"
with all the strength of his lungs. He repeated the blow, the cry.
Again he heard, when he paused to listen, the faint splashing of the
water, the creaking of the boards behind him. Then, just as he raised
his hand for one more blow on the door, he felt it open a very little,
pushing him back.
And at the same moment a voice whispered:
"Sh-sh!"
Very gradually the door was opened a little farther. A hand caught the
sleeve of his coat. It was quite dark outside the door--as dark as in
the front room.
"Sh-sh!" was whispered again in his ear, as he felt himself drawn
through the narrow aperture.
He made no attempt to resist, for he knew, he felt, that the hand was
Carrie's, and that this was rescue.
When he had passed into the second room, Max was stopped by a warning
pressure of the hand upon his arm, and then he felt the touch of
Carrie's lips upon his ear, so close did she come before she uttered
these words:
"Don't make a sound. Come slowly, very quietly, very carefully. You're
all right."
He heard her close the door through which he had just come, and then he
let her lead him, in silence and in the darkness, until they reached
another door. This she opened with the same caution, and Max, passing
through with her, found himself, as he knew by the little step down onto
the brick floor, in the outhouse.
"Who's that?" said a man's voice, startling Max, and confirming in an
instant the suspicions he had had that the outrage to which he had been
subjected was the work of a gang.
"It's me--Carrie," said the girl.
And opening the outer door, she drove Max out with a gentle push, and
closed it between herself and him.
"Thank God!" was his first muttered exclamation, as he felt the welcome
rush of cold night air and felt himself free again.
But the very next moment he turned back instinctively to the door and
attempted to push it open. The latch was gone; he had broken it himself.
But the door was now locked against him.
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