He looked with disgust at the stale, foul-smelling, half-cold mess, and turned his head away. He was feeling bodily ill as well as depressed; and the sight of the food sickened him. “You will be ill if you don't eat,” said the soldier hurriedly. “Take a bit of bread, anyway; it'll do you good.” The man spoke with a curious earnestness of tone, lifting a piece of sodden bread from the plate and putting it down again. All the conspirator awoke in the Gadfly; he had guessed at once that there was something hidden in the bread. “You can leave it; I'll eat a bit by and by,” he said carelessly. The door was open, and he knew that the sergeant on the stairs could hear every word spoken between them. When the door was locked on him again, and he had satisfied himself that no one was watching at the spy-hole, he took up the piece of bread and carefully crumbled it away. In the middle was the thing he had expected, a bundle of small files. It was wrapped in a bit of paper, on which a few words were written. He smoothed the paper out carefully and carried it to what little light there was. The writing was crowded into so narrow a space, and on such thin paper, that it was very difficult to read. “The door is unlocked, and there is no moon. Get the filing done as fast as possible, and come by the passage between two and three. We are quite ready and may not have another chance.” He crushed the paper feverishly in his hand. All the preparations were ready, then, and he had only to file the window bars; how lucky it was that the chains were off! He need not stop about filing them. How many bars were there? Two, four; and each must be filed in two places: eight. Oh, he could manage that in the course of the night if he made haste---- How had Gemma and Martini contrived to get everything ready so quickly--disguises, passports, hiding-places? They must have worked like cart-horses to do it---- And it was her plan that had been adopted after all. He laughed a little to himself at his own foolishness; as if it mattered whether the plan was hers or not, once it was a good one! And yet he could not help being glad that it was she who had struck on the idea of his utilizing the subterranean passage, instead of letting himself down by a rope-ladder, as the smugglers had at first suggested. Hers was the more complex and difficult plan, but did not involve, as the other did, a risk to the life of the sentinel on duty outside the east wall. Therefore, when the two schemes had been laid before him, he had unhesitatingly chosen Gemma's.