k, and feeling himself still very drowsy, he merely turned
over and went to sleep again. And still overpowered by the combined
action of the laudanum and the beer-opium and hops, he slept on until a
very late hour of the night, when at length he awoke; but perceiving
that all was quite dark and still, he lay quietly in bed, thinking this
was about the longest night he had ever spent in his life. At last he
got up, and opened the blinds to see if it was near day. And perceiving
by a faint light streak along the horizon that the morning was at hand,
he opened the other blinds, and began to dress himself as well as he
could in the semi-darkness.

By the time he had got on all his clothes, the day was a little lighter,
and he went into the passage to see after the safety of his prisoner.

He found young Munson stretched upon the mattress immediately before
the door.

"Quite correct," he thought; but he resolved to go up to the door to
make a closer examination. First he saw that the key had been taken out
of the lock.

"All right," he said to himself. "Munson has obeyed orders, and put the
key in his pocket."

And then still farther to assure himself of the safety of his charge, he
bent over the sleeping form of Munson and tried the lock, and found it
fast.

"Quite correct! Nothing has been neglected. He is a careful officer, and
shall be well reported at head-quarters," he muttered, with much
satisfaction.

But to reach the lock at all, he had been obliged to bend so far over
the sleeping body, that now, in trying to recover his perpendicular, he
lost his balance, and fell heavily, nearly crushing and quite waking
Munson, who, in struggling to throw off the burden, recognized old
Purley, but pretending to mistake him for Mr. Berners, grappled him by
the throat, exclaiming:

"No you don't you villain! You don't get her out of this room except
over my dead body!" And he shook him furiously.

"It's me--me--me, Bob! Do-do-don't choke me to death!" gasped old
Purley, as he struggled and freed his throat for an instant from the
grasp of Robert's hands.

But Munson throttled and shook him more furiously than before, singing
out:

"Help! murder! arson! Here's this man reskying of my prisoner!" And he
shook him until his teeth rattled in his head.

"Oh, my good lord! I shall be strangled with the best of intention,"
sputtered the terrified and half-suffocated victim, as for an another
instant he freed his throat fr