The devils were out; never once did I doubt it. The alarm bell ringing loudly in the corridor, the tramp of feet as of an army marching, the cry of man to man proclaimed the fact beyond any cavil. If the clang of arms and the loud word of command had found me unwilling to believe that sailors must die that night on the reef to the southward side, the voice of Edmond Czerny himself, crying by the very door behind which I stood, would have answered the question for good and all. For Czerny I heard, I would have staked my life on it--Czerny, whom last I had seen at Nice on the morning of his marriage. "To the work, to the work!" I heard him shouting; "let Steinvertz come to me. There is a ship on the Caskets--a ship, do you hear?" His voice was hoarse and high-pitched, like the voice of a man half mad with delirium. Those that answered him spoke in terms not less measured. Had a pack of wild hounds been slipped suddenly to its prey, no howls more terrifying could have been heard than those which echoed in that house of mystery. And then, upon the top of the clamour, as though to mark the meaning of it, came silence, a silence so awesome that I could hear myself breathing. "They've left the house, then," I said to Miss Ruth in a whisper; "that's something to be glad about!" She passed the remark by and, seating herself in a chair, she buried her face in her hands. I could hear her muttering "God help them--God help them!" and I knew that she spoke of those dying out on the dangerous reef. For the time being she seemed to have forgotten my presence; but, after a spell, she looked up suddenly and answered the question. "Yes," she said; "my husband will be on the yacht. He has not the courage to be anywhere else. You and I are quite alone now, Jasper." My fingers closed tight about my seaman's cap, and I went to the door and unlocked it. Strong and clear in my head, and not to be denied, was something which seemed to set my brain on fire. "My God," I said, "what does it mean?" Was it chance or madness that I should pass it by? "There would be men below at the furnaces and others standing to guard," I put it to her; "how many in all do you make out that a man might chance to meet if he went below just now, Miss Ruth?" She became very calm at the words, I thought, and stood up that she might take my words more readily. "Jasper!" she exclaimed, "what are you going to do, Jasper?" "God knows," said I. "Tell me how many men there are in this house." She stood and thought about it. The flushed face told the story of her hopes. Neither of us would speak all that came leaping to our tongues. "There would be five, I think, in the engine-house and six for the guards," she said, and I could almost see her counting them; "the lower gate is the second in the corridor. There is a ladder there, and--oh, Jasper, what do you mean?" she asked again.