Suiting the action implied in his words, Phil opened the door leading from the living-room. He saw by the aid of the additional light from outside that the five men had cautiously and stealthily moved backward toward the wall nearest them, and were apparently supporting their weights upon it. Suddenly he felt a jar and read in the eyes of the Filipino nearest him revenge battling with fear. Then the floor shook, and grasping Sydney by the shoulder Phil threw himself bodily through the open door as the floor of the building crashed down twenty feet into the cellar below. The natives, he could see, were hung on the wall like so many old coats, while through the bamboo floor on which he and Sydney had just stood numberless bamboo spears bared their sharp, venomous points. The lad shuddered as he realized the murderous trick which had failed. If they had fallen with the floor, heavily weighted as it was with stones at the side, and resting on supports, which had been dislodged by a rope in the hands of one of the villains now hanging on the wall of the room, they would at this moment be lying pierced through and perhaps dying before the eyes of their cruel enemy. He raised his revolver and covered the nearest cringing native, a terrible anger in his eyes. In another second he would have pulled the trigger, but Sydney’s hand closed firmly over his wrist, forcing his revolver upward and the ball sped harmlessly over the terrified native’s head. “They are more valuable alive,” Sydney exclaimed to Phil’s angry cry of protest. “Come, let’s get outside before more of this hinged floor is loosened. We can better prevent their escape in that way.”