lethargy fled, and with it every deadening thought of her who had so
suddenly woven about me the meshes of her power. False or true, maid,
wife, or widow, my duty as a soldier to my commander and the army to
which I belonged, blotted out all else. Even as this new rush of
determination swept over me, above us there sounded clearly the dashing
music of a military band in the strains of a Strauss's waltz, and we
could distinguish the muffled shuffling of many feet on the oaken floor
overhead. Caton's chance remark about the great ball to be given that
evening by officers of the headquarters staff recurred to my memory.

"That dancing up there will help us, Jed," I said quickly, my mind now
active to grasp every detail. "You say there is a chance for escape
from your cell? Then give me your hand, and help me to crawl through
that hole."

It was a narrow squeeze for a man of my size, yet I crept through
without great difficulty, and found myself in the dense darkness of a
room which, as I judged hastily from feeling about me, was similar in
shape and extent to the one in which I had been confined.

Bungay, however, permitted me little time for exploration. Grasping me
firmly by one arm, and feeling his way along the wall, he groped across
to the other side.

"There's a mighty big stone chimbly comes down yere, Cap," he
whispered, his lips close to my ears, although the noise above made
conversation in an ordinary tone perfectly safe. "An' ther openin' ter
take out soot an' ashes is up thar, jist b'low ther fluer. It's a
sheet-iron pan, I reckon, ther way it feels; an' it must be thar they
put a nigger in ter clean ther chimbly whin it gits stuffed up. I could