"They are cutting through the door in the kitchen below."
They opened the door then and cautiously peered down, but there
was nothing to be seen. I touched Jim gingerly on the arm.
"Is it--is it Flannigan," I asked, "shut in there?"
"No--yes--I don't know," he returned absently. "Run along and
don't bother, Kit. He may take to shooting any minute."
Anne and I went out then and shut the door, and went into the
dining room and sat on our feet, for of course the bullets might
come up through the floor. Aunt Selina joined us there, and
Bella, and the Mercer girls, and we sat around and talked in
whispers, and Leila Mercer told of the time her grandfather had
had a struggle with an escaped lunatic.
In the midst of the excitement Tom appeared in a bathrobe,
looking very pale, with a bandage around his head, and the nurse
at his heels threatening to leave and carrying a bottle of
medicine and a spoon. He went immediately to the pantry, and soon
we could hear him giving orders and the rest hurrying around to
obey them. The hammering ceased, and the silence was even worse.
It was more suggestive.
In about fifteen minutes there was a thud, as if the cage had
fallen, and the sound of feet rushing down the cellar stairs.
Then there were groans and loud oaths, and everybody talking at
once, below, and the sound of a struggle.
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