walked into the spider's web. Then he shifted his position
and prepared to think. But, as he moved his foot struck something. A
wallet, it felt like; he reached down, and, by dint of feeling about,
managed to get his fingers on it.

The leather was still warm, and Roy realized that it must have been
dropped into the cellar from the bearded man's pocket when he leaned over
to see if Roy had reached the bottom of the ladder.

"Queer find," thought the boy. "I'll keep it. Maybe there's something in
it that may result in bringing those rascals to justice."

He thrust it into his pocket and thought no more of it. His mind was busy
on other things just then. If only he had a match! He felt in all his
pockets without result, and was about giving up in despair, when, in the
lining of his coat, he felt several lucifers. They had slipped through a
hole in his pocket.

"Gee whiz! How lucky that Aunt Sally forgot to mend that pocket," thought
the boy, eagerly thrusting his fingers through the aperture and drawing
out a dozen or more matches.

"These may stand me in good stead, now. But I don't want to waste them.
Guess I'll just light one to see what kind of a place I'm in, and then
trust to the sense of touch if I see any means of escape."

There was a scratch and a splutter, and the match flared bravely. Its
yellow rays illumined a cellar very much like any other cellar. It was
walled with stonework, well cemented, and there were two or three small
windows at the sides. But these, which at first filled Roy with a flush of
hope, proved, on examination, to have been bricked up, and solidly, too.

"Nothing doing there," he muttered, and turned his attention to the rear
of the underground place where there was a flight of steps leading up to a
horizontal door, which, evidently, opened on the outerworld. But this door
was secured on the under side by a rusty padlock of formidable dimensions.
Roy tried it. It was solid as the Rock of Gibraltar, as the advertisements
say.

"Stuck!" he muttered disappointedly; and yet: "Hold on! What about that
pocket tool kit I had when I started out on the auto? Hooray! Those chaps
forgot to search me. Thought it was too much trouble, I guess. Now for a
sharp file! Good! here's one! Now, then, if the luck holds, I'll be free
in not much more than a long jiffy!"

These thoughts shot through Roy's brain, as he selected a file from his
fortunate find, and began working away at the hasp of the pad