standing at the far side of the room by the unglazed window;
which, being in a sloping part of the roof, inclined slightly
also. He had raised the shutter which closed it, and on his tip-
toes--for the sill was almost his own height from the floor--was
peering out. I looked sharply at Croisette. "Is there a gutter
outside?" I whispered, beginning to tingle all over as the
thought of escape for the first time occurred to me.

"No," he answered in the same tone. "But Marie says he can see a
beam below, which he thinks we can reach."

I sprang up, promptly displaced Marie, and looked out. When my
eyes grew accustomed to the gloom I discerned a dark chaos of
roofs and gables stretching as far as I could see before me.
Nearer, immediately under the window, yawned a chasm--a narrow
street. Beyond this was a house rather lower than that in which
we were, the top of its roof not quite reaching the level of my
eyes.

"I see no beam," I said.

"Look below!" quoth Marie, stolidly,

I did so, and then saw that fifteen or sixteen feet below our
window there was a narrow beam which ran from our house to the
opposite one--for the support of both, as is common in towns. In
the shadow near the far end of this--it was so directly under our
window that I could only see the other end of it--I made out a
casement, faintly illuminated from within.