ed last June, an' it's only punched once, so 't couldn't 'a'
been used all the way. I say, Professor, am I asleep or awake?"

As I examined the several articles which we had come upon so strangely
in this incongruous plate, a flood of light was let in upon my mind, and
with this came also the glad certainty that the way before us to freedom
was open and assured. My belief that the Priest Captain had been in
communication with the outside world no longer admitted of a doubt, for
here was absolute proof of it: the clothes which he wore when making his
expeditions into the nineteenth century; the lantern that he had stolen
in order the more easily to find his way through the cave; the railway
ticket that he had but lately used. In an instant I had connected all
this with what the guardian of the archives had told me concerning the
Priest Captain's habit of retiring for long periods of time to one of
the chambers in which we had been imprisoned, and the whole matter was
as plain to me as day; and I knew now, that in order to guard against
discovery, he, or one of his predecessors, to whom this secret way must
also have been known, had caused to be set in place the fastening by
which the grating could be secured upon its inner side; which fastening,
within that very hour, had been the means of saving our lives.

"Well," said Young, dryly, when I had briefly explained these several
matters, "I guess he won't pull th' wool over nobody's eyes any more!
An' now you an' me 'll do some prospectin'. We must go back upstairs,
before we pull out for good, an' bag what there is there that's worth
carryin' off; but th' first thing t' do is t' get Rayburn where he'll be
comfortable an' safe. Until that's attended to we've got t' be careful
an' go slow; so we'll rouse up this fool of a Pablo, an' get it into his
head that if he hears anybody comin' he's t' knock th' plug from under
Mullins an' let him down, an' then chock him fast with a rock
underneath. It's not likely that anybody _will_ come, an' even if they
do, I don't think that they'll know th' trick about Mullins' tippin',
for that's a point that I'll bet a whole kag o' beer th' Priest Captain
didn't give away t' nobody. I tell you, Professor, there wasn't any
flies on that old man, now was there? He was a wicked old devil, an'
I'm glad I did for him; but he was just an everlastin' keen one, an' a
rustler from th' word go!"

In the dazed condition in which he then was, we scarce