not despair; I was not
without experience of shutters. I selected one closed not quite tight,
leaving a crack for my knife-blade. I found the hook inside, got my
dagger under it, and at length drove it up. The shutter creaked shrilly
open.

A few good blows knocked in the casement. I followed.

I found myself in a small room bare of everything but dust. From this,
once a porter's room, I fancied, I passed out into a hallway dimly
lighted from the open window behind me. The hall was large, paved with
black and white marbles; at the end a stately stairway mounted into
mysterious gloom.

My heart jumped into my mouth and I cringed back in terror, a choked cry
rasping my throat. For, as I crossed the hall, peering into the dimness,
I descried, stationed on the lowest stair with upraised bludgeon, a man.

For a second I stood in helpless startlement, voiceless, motionless,
waiting for him to brain me. Then my half-uttered scream changed to a
quavering laugh, as my eyes, becoming used to the gloom, discovered my
bogy to be but a figure carved in wood, holding aloft a long since
quenched flambeau.

I blushed with shame, yet I cannot say that now I felt no fear. I
thought of the panic-stricken women, the doomed men, who had fled at the
sword's point up these very stairs. The silence seemed to shriek at me,
and I half thought I saw fear-maddened eyes peering out from the
shadowed corners. Yet for all that--nay, because of that--I would not
give up the adventure. I went back into the little room and carefully
closed the shutter, lest some other meddler should spy my misdeed. Then
I set my feet on the stair.

If the half-light before had been full of eery terror, it was naught to
the blackness now. My hand on the rail was damp. Yet I mounted steadily.

Up one flight I climbed, groped in the hot dark for the foot of the next
flight, and went on. Suddenly, above, I heard a noise. I came to an
instant halt. All was as still as the tomb. I listened; not a breath
broke the silence. It never occurred to me to imagine a rat in this
house of the dead, and the noise shook me. With a sick feeling about my
heart I went on again.

On the next floor it was lighter. Faint outlines of doors and passages
were visible. I could not stand the gloom a moment longer; I strode into
the nearest doorway and across the room to where a gleam of brightness
outlined the window. My shaking fingers found the hook of the shutter
and flung it wide, le