The rest was comparatively easy. The iron was tough and strong but, by bending it up and down, they succeeded at last in breaking it off. It was the lower hinge of the door, upon which they had operated, as the loss of a piece of iron there would be less likely to catch the eye of anyone coming in. They collected some dust from the corner of the room, moistened it, and rubbed it on to the wood so as to take away its freshness of appearance; and they then set to work with the piece of iron, which was of a curved shape, about three inches long, an inch wide, and an eighth of an inch thick. Taking it by turns, they ground away the stone round the bottom of one of the bars. For the first inch, the stone yielded readily to the iron; but below that it became harder, and their progress was slow. They filled the hole which they had made with water, to soften the stone, and worked steadily away till night; when, to their great joy, they found that they had reached the bottom of the bar. They then enlarged the hole inwards, in order that the bar might be pulled back. Fortunately, it was much decayed by age; and they had no doubt that, by exerting all their strength, together they could bend it sufficiently to enable them to get through. At the hour when their dinner was brought they had ceased their work, filled up the hole with dust collected from the floor, put some dust of the stone over it, and smoothed it down, so that it would not have been noticed by anyone casually looking from the window. It was late at night before they finished their work. Their hands were sore and bleeding, and they were completely worn out with fatigue. They had saved, from their dinner, a good-sized piece of bread. They folded up into a small compass the leaf from his pocketbook, upon which Charlie had written in Hindostanee his letter to Hossein, and thrust this into the centre of the piece of bread. Then Charlie told Tim to lie down and rest for three hours, while he kept watch; as they must take it in turns, all night, to listen in case Hossein should come outside. The lamp was kept burning. Just as Charlie's watch was over, he thought he heard a very faint splash in the water below. Two or three minutes later, he again thought he heard the sound. He peered out of the window anxiously, but the night was dark, and he could see nothing. Listening intently, it seemed to him, several times, that he heard the same faint sound. Presently something whizzed by him, and looking round, to his delight he saw a small arrow, with a piece of very thin string attached. The arrow was made of very light wood. Round the iron point was a thick wrapping of cotton, which would entirely deaden its sound, as it struck a wall. It was soaked in water, and Charlie had no doubt that the sound he heard was caused by its fall into the moat, after ineffectual trials to shoot through the window.