Chapter Twenty Seven. The Death-Trap.

When Roddy again became conscious of his surroundings he found himself lying in a corner of the place, so weak that he was scarcely able to move his arms. His head was throbbing, and placing his hand upon it, he found himself suffering from a long scalp wound.

He lay for quite an hour staring up at the plaster ceiling which was peeling after many years of neglect. He tried to recall what had occurred.

Mistily he remembered his desperate fight for liberty, and how old Claribut had eventually clubbed him with a short, pliable life-preserver.

It seemed to be again morning. His lips were parched, his throat contracted, and he felt feverish and ill. Water was there, and he managed to reach it.

“What can I do?” he cried faintly to himself. “I must get out of this. I must! How many days have I been here, I wonder?” and again his hand felt his chin. The growth of beard had increased, and by it he knew that already he must have been there a week—or even more.

For the hundredth time he glanced at the heavy old door, and saw how a small panel had been sawn out near the bottom to admit the introduction of the plate and jug. The mysterious hand that fed him was that of the old man whom he recollected as having been at Willowden. Outwardly the old fellow seemed feeble, but he certainly was the reverse when put to the test.

Roddy ambled across to where his raincoat lay upon the stones. In its pocket was the cigar-box, two coils of wire—aerial and “earth”—and the head-’phones. He opened the box and, as far as he could discover, it was intact. But of what use was it?

He sighed and slowly packed it back into the pocket of the coat, which afterwards he dropped back upon the spot whence he had picked it up.

Suddenly he heard a footstep outside and the panel in the door was slid back, the grey evil face of old Claribut being revealed in the aperture.

“Hulloa!” he exclaimed with a harsh laugh. “So you’ve come to your senses again—eh? I hope you liked what I gave you for attacking me, young man?”

“I only tried to escape,” was Roddy’s reply.

“Well, that you won’t do,” the other laughed. “You’ll never leave here alive. I’ll take good care of that.”

“Oh! We shall see,” replied Roddy, whose stout heart had not yet forsaken him. It was not the first time in his life that he had been in a tight corner, and after all he was ever optimistic. The only thing that troubled him was the wound in his head.

“You were useful once,” said the evil-faced old criminal. “But now you are of no further use. Do you understand that?”

“Yes, I do; and no, I don’t,” was Roddy’s defiant reply.

“Well, you’re only an encumbrance,” he said. “And you’re young to die like a rat in a hole?”

“That’s very interesting,” Roddy remarked grimly. “And who’s going to be my executioner, pray?”

“You’ll learn that in due course,” said his evil-faced janitor, who then opened the door after removing two strong bars.

Roddy instantly sprang at him, but he found himself so weak that he was as a child in Claribut’s hands.

The old man seized him, and dragging him out roughly thrust him down some spiral atone stairs and into a stone chamber below the one in which he had been confined. It was about the same size and smelt damp and mouldy. The window, strongly barred, was as high up as the one in the chamber above. When he had bundled the helpless man down the stairs, with one hand, he took the raincoat and flung it into the chamber after him.

All Roddy’s protests and struggles were useless. In his weak physical state, still more exhausted by loss of blood from his wound, he was helpless as a child, as Claribut flung him upon the damp shiny stones, saying with a laugh of triumph:

“You’ll stay there and die—now that you’re no longer wanted!”

Next second Roddy, lying where he had been flung, heard the door being bolted and barred.

He was again alone!

He raised himself slowly and painfully from the slimy stones and gazed around. The walls were green and damp and the place smelt muddy.

Suddenly his eager ears caught the faint ripple of water. There was a river flowing outside!

Again he listened. No longer could he hear Claribut’s footsteps, but only the low ripple as the water ran past beneath the window. He judged that the pavement upon which he stood was on a level with the river.

But where was he? What was the nature of the place he was in—those strong stone walls that had probably stood there for centuries. In any case the intention of his enemies was that it should be his tomb!

It was still morning—early morning he judged it to be. But suddenly as he stood there he saw that the clouds had darkened, and he heard the rain falling slowly upon the surface of the river outside.

Gradually the stones upon which he stood became wetter. Water was oozing up from between the crevices everywhere.

The river was rising. The ghastly truth all at once fell upon him, benumbing his senses. If the rain continued to fall then the river would rise, and he would be drowned, as Claribut had prophesied—drowned like a rat in a hole!

Realisation of the situation held him rigid as a statue.

For a few moments he was plunged into despair.

Then suddenly a thought came to him. There was still a hundredth chance left.

So taking out his pocket-book he scribbled an urgent message to Elma, stating that he was confined in some house beside the river, that the flood was rising, and telling her that he had with him his new wireless receiver, asked her to speak to him, if she chanced to be at Farncombe. He urged her to hasten to his side.

His handwriting was irregular, for his hand trembled as he wrote. But having finished it he took out a frayed but plain envelope, and addressed it: “Urgent: Miss Elma Sandys, Farncombe Towers, near Haslemere.”

Having placed the message inside, he sealed it, and managed, after many futile attempts, to toss it through the barred window.

If it fell upon the face of the waters it might be picked up by some inquisitive person out boating or fishing. Yet he knew not what river was flowing by. He had an idea that it was the Thames, because on the previous day he had seen the brilliant flash of light blue as a kingfisher had sped past the window.

The envelope fluttered from the window—a forlorn hope.

From the crevices in the paving the water was still rising, even though the heavy shower had passed, and the sun was again shining.

Feeling a trifle better and more hopeful, he again took out his wireless receiving-set from the pocket of his discarded raincoat. Old Claribut evidently intended that when the river overwhelmed him, and later he might be found dead, his coat should be with him. Had it been left above there might have been more serious suspicions of foul play.

Claribut, as an old criminal, left nothing to chance. When Roddy Homfray died there should also be found his belongings. That was what he intended.

The first fear which entered Roddy’s mind was that the dampness of the stones might have affected the sensitiveness of the set. Eagerly he commenced to string up his aerial to several old nails which he found in the wall above the height of his head. Then he put down an “earth” wire under one of the small stones in the wet floor, which he lifted for that purpose.

After preparations which lasted ten minutes or so he held the cigar-box in his hand, and putting on the head-’phones listened and turned the condenser to receive waves of nine hundred metres.

In a few moments his heart gave a bound. His set worked and the water had not injured it, for he heard the operator at the London aerodrome telephoning to an aeroplane in flight towards Paris.

Those words through the ether gave him renewed courage. His set was working!

Would that he could hear Elma’s answering voice.

The envelope had fluttered from the window, yet the only sound that reached him was the low lapping of the water and the songs of the birds.

He listened to the daily traffic in the air, the Morse and telephony, all of which he knew so well. Yet he was unable to call for help. He could only listen—listen for Elma’s words of encouragement.

But would she ever receive that message tossed at haphazard from that barred high-up window—tossed into the air or upon the water? Which he knew not.

An hour later another sharp shower fell, and as it did so the water percolated through the floor until it was quite two inches deep. It was an ugly sign.

Would Elma receive his message and come to his rescue?

At some moments he gave up the situation as hopeless. His father’s reluctance to tell him the truth concerning Gray and his accomplice, the woman Crisp who was actually on visiting terms with Mr Sandys and his daughter, utterly puzzled him. He had trusted his father before all men, yet the poor old rector had died with his secret locked in his heart.

A thousand conflicting thoughts arose within him, all weird, mysterious, inscrutable. Why should his own father have held back from him the truth? Why should Mr Sandys demand from him the secret of his discovery of the girl in Welling Wood?

What connexion could there be with the City magnate and the girl whom he had believed was dead, but who was certainly still alive?

As the day faded the rain, which had ceased for an hour, again fell heavily, and in the dim grey light he could see the water rising almost imperceptibly, until it had already reached his knees.

He still listened intently, but though he heard a concert sent out from Marconi House, on four hundred metres, gay music which jarred upon the nerves of a doomed man, and also the voices of amateurs in the vicinity, yet no sound was there of Elma.

Would she be able to get the transmission set to work? The thought caused him to hold his breath. Even if she received his message it might be too late if the rain continued and the river rose further!

He recollected how, when at Mr Sandys’ request he obtained official permission and had erected the telephone transmission set, he had given Elma several lessons in its working until once or twice she had spoken to him at the Rectory from the Towers and had once given him a gramophone selection. He knew that the exact filament current on the valves was necessary for clear speech. Would she remember the exact instructions he had given her?

But after all he had merely cast his urgent appeal to the wind. He did not even know whether it had floated upon the water. Perhaps it might have been caught in a tree and would remain unseen until the paper rotted and dropped!

Darkness fell, and the only sound that reached his living tomb was the low lapping of the waters, as slowly but surely they rose.

There was no acknowledgment of his message. He held the receiver above the level of the waters in breathless expectancy, knowing that if water entered the box its sensibility would at once be destroyed.

A weather forecast was given out from the Air Ministry, followed by an amateur in London with bad modulation trying to call a fellow amateur in Liverpool, but no acknowledgment from the girl he loved and from whom he had been so rudely parted.

Would she ever get his message of distress? His heart sank when he knew that the chance was so small.

Truly his enemies held him powerless, and their intention was that he should either starve or drown!

He had hoped against hope, until he, alas! gave up.

The river was still rising and very soon the flood must engulf him!