"Let us be on,"--imperatively. "I shall not only catch my death of cold, but I shall be horribly compromised." "My dear young lady, on the word of a gentleman, I will do the best I can to get you out of this cellar. If I have jested a little, it was only in the effort to give you courage; for I haven't the slightest idea how we are going to get out of this dismal hole." We went on. We couldn't see half a dozen feet in front of us. The gloom beyond the dozen feet was Stygian and menacing. And the great grim shadows that crept behind us as we proceeded! Once the girl stumbled and fell against me. "What's the matter?" I asked, startled. "I stepped on something that--that moved!"--plaintively. "Possibly it was a potato; there's a bin of them over there. Where the deuce are we?" "If you swear, I shall certainly scream!" she warned. "But I can swear in the most elegant and approved fashion." "I am not inclined to have you demonstrate your talents." "Aha! Here is the coal-bin. Perhaps the window may be open. If so, we are saved. Will you hold the candle for a moment?" Have you ever witnessed a cat footing it across the snow? If you have, picture me imitating her. Cautiously I took one step, then another; and then that mountain of coal turned into a roaring tread-mill. Sssssh! Rrrrr! In a moment I was buried to the knees and nearly suffocated. I became angry. I would reach that window-- "Hush! Hush! The noise, the noise!" whispered the girl, waving the candle frantically. But I was determined. Again I tried. This time I slipped and fell on my hands. As I strove to get up, the cord of my gown became tangled about my feet. The girl choked; whether with coal-dust or with laughter I could not say, as she still had on her cambric-mask. "Forgive me," she said. And then I knew it was not the coal-dust. "I'll forgive you, but I will not promise to forget." "Merciful heavens! you must not try that again. Think of the noise!" "Was I making any noise?"--rubbing the perspiration from my forehead. (I had taken off my mask.) "Noise? The trump of Judgment Day will be feeble compared to it. Surely some one has heard you. Why not lay that board on top of the coal?" A good idea. I made use of it at once. The window was unlatched, but there was a heavy wire-screen nailed to the sills outside. There was no getting out that way. The gods were evidently busy elsewhere. "Nothing doing," I murmured, a bit discouraged. "And even if there was, you really could not expect me to risk my neck and dignity by climbing through a window like that. Let us give up the idea of windows and seek the cellar-doors, those that give to the grounds. I declare I shall leave by no other exit." "It was very kind of you to let me make an ass of myself like that. Why didn't you tell me beforehand?"