hained to a tree by LeBlanc and Anderson, I had those matches
and never once thought of them."

So saying, he carefully struck one of the matches and lighted the
candle. He now had a chance to examine the prison room that he was in.
Save for the door, the only other means of egress from the room was a
solitary window, but a quick examination showed that escape in this way
was impossible, for the shutter of the window, instead of being composed
of wood was made of a solid piece of iron.

Phil then examined the door, finding that this was evidently made of
several thicknesses of hard wood, so thick was it, that when he rapped
strongly with his knuckles, it gave forth a dead heavy sound, showing
that it was unusually thick. It was so thick and hard, in fact, as to
defy any effort to cut it through with his knife. Phil hardly knew what
to do; all way of escaping seemed barred to him.

There was one chance, however, and that was a possibility of attacking
whatever guard came to bring him food in the morning, for he did not
believe that they intended to starve him to death.

Grasping the bottle that held the candle, he went over and made an
examination of the cot. It was an old folding cot, made of fairly heavy
cross braces, bound with substantial pieces of metal.

Phil unshipped his knife from the coat lapel cache, and immediately set
to work to whittle away one of the cross pieces that supported the cot.
He whittled in such a fashion that on one end remained one of the iron
braces, screwed securely to the stick of wood. Hefting it in his hand,
and then swinging it about his head, Phil discovered that he had a
weapon that would almost fell an ox. His plan was to wait beside the
door in the morning until whoever brought him his food should have
unlocked the door, then to strike him down, and while he was stunned,
take a chance on escaping from the house.

The broken cot did not offer a very comfortable sleeping place, but Phil
propped it up the best he could and lay down upon it. It was too
rickety, so stripping the tattered blanket from it, he lay upon the
floor.

This was no hardship to him, as he had spent many a night of his life
sleeping upon the hard, solid earth, which is not a whit softer than a
flooring made of pine boards.

As he lay dozing, he almost fancied that he could hear a very low murmur
of voices. Telling himself that it was only his imagination, he rolled
over again and tried to sleep, but the exc