and befoul the
Bran Brook. For cleaning out the trap-room had an outer door, of heavy,
solid oak, carefully locked, which when opened enabled the slaves
entrusted with this task to dredge or bale or scoop out the filth and
convey it off to be used as garden manure. There was also an inner door,
as heavy and solid as the other, opening from the cellar, which enabled my
uncle to inspect the trap at his convenience. This door Agathemer opened.

I peered in and, after my eyes became accustomed to the gloom, descried
the opening of the outfall drain opposite me. It was large enough for lean
men like me and Agathemer to crawl through, but certainly barely large
enough. I could see, after some moments, the lower ends of the drain
pipes, two dozen or more, dipping into the foul liquid which filled the
cistern. It was very foul, for since my uncle's death the cleaning out of
the trap had been neglected and the ooze came almost to the top of the
water.

Agathemer hunted about the cellar, found some bits of stone about the size
of apples, put them in the bag of food, tied up its neck again, and threw
it into the trap, where it sank out of sight. After it he threw in the two
keys.

Now was the moment for our plunge into the unknown. Agathemer's plan
implied that we must crawl a full furlong through the outfall drain. We
might be drowned, at any point of the crawl, by a rush of water from the
bath-tank. We might suffocate in the foul vapours of the drain. But,
plainly, Agathemer had pitched upon our only chance of escape, and we must
escape that way and at once or not at all.

Agathemer threw the two copper cylinders, one after the other, neatly and
deftly into the mouth of the outfall drain.

"Now," he said, "one of us must jump for that opening, and must cling to
it, his arms inside, his body in the ooze of the trap. The other must
stand on the narrow stone ledge inside this door, must contrive to slam
the door behind him so that it will shut fast and stay shut, must then, in
the pitch dark, jump for the shoulders of the other. If the drag of his
weight pulls the other down, both of us will drown in this deep trap in
the vile ooze. If the under man clings on, the upper must crawl over him
into the drain, pass back to him one of the cylinders and then we shall be
ready for our crawl down. Which goes first?"

"You choose," said I.

"Can you slam the door?" Agathemer queried.

I considered the door, the sill, the ledge insi