At a quarter past 9, a sudden flash showed them the outline of the palisade; and scarcely had they passed the gateway when there came a terrible clap of thunder. In a moment the corral was crossed, and Smith stood before the house. It was possible that the unknown being was here, since it was from this place that the telegraph had come. Nevertheless, there was no light in the window. The engineer knocked at the door, but without response. He opened it, and the colonists entered the room, which was in utter darkness. A light was struck by Neb, and in a moment the lantern was lit, and its light directed into every corner of the chamber. No one was there, and everything remained undisturbed. “Are we victims to a delusion?” murmured Smith. No! that was impossible! The telegraph had certainly said:—— “Come to the corral quickly as possible.” He went to the table on which the apparatus was arranged. Everything was in place and in order. “Who was here last?” asked the engineer. “I, sir,” answered Ayrton. “And that was——” “Four days ago.” “Ah! here is something!” exclaimed Herbert, pointing to a paper lying on the table. On the paper were these words, written in English:—— “Follow the new wire.” “Come on!” cried Smith, who comprehended in a moment that the dispatch had not been sent from the corral, but from the mysterious abode which the new wire united directly with Granite House. Neb took the lantern and all left the corral. Then the storm broke forth with extreme violence. Flashes of lightning and peals of thunder followed in rapid succession. The island was the centre of the storm. By the flashes of lightning they could see the summit of Mount Franklin enshrouded in smoke. There were no telegraph poles inside the corral, but the engineer, having passed the gate, ran to the nearest post, and saw there a new wire fastened to the insulator, and reaching to the ground. “Here it is!” he cried. The wire lay along the ground, and was covered with some insulating substance, like the submarine cables. By its direction it seemed as if it went towards the west, across the woods, and the southern spurs of the mountain. “Let us follow it,” said Smith. And sometimes by the light of the lantern, sometimes by the illumination of the heavens, the colonists followed the way indicated by the thread. They crossed in the first place, the spur of the mountain between the valley of the corral and that of Fall River, which stream was crossed in its narrowest part. The wire, sometimes hanging on the lower branches of the trees, sometimes trailing along the ground, was a sure guide. The engineer had thought that, perhaps, the wire would end at the bottom of the valley, and that the unknown retreat was there.