But when I turned to get back to the passage, I could not find
the outlet, and fumbled round and round until my brain was dizzy, and I
fell senseless to the ground.
CHAPTER 5
THE RESCUE
Shades of the dead, have I not heard your voices
Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale?--_Byron_
When I came to myself I was lying, not in the outer blackness of the
Mohune vault, not on a floor of sand; but in a bed of sweet clean linen,
and in a little whitewashed room, through the window of which the spring
sunlight streamed. Oh, the blessed sunshine, and how I praised God for
the light! At first I thought I was in my own bed at my aunt's house, and
had dreamed of the vault and the smugglers, and that my being prisoned in
the darkness was but the horror of a nightmare. I was for getting up, but
fell back on my pillow in the effort to rise, with a weakness and sick
languor which I had never known before. And as I sunk down, I felt
something swing about my neck, and putting up my hand, found 'twas
Colonel John Mohune's black locket, and so knew that part at least of
this adventure was no dream.
Then the door opened, and to my wandering thought it seemed that I was
back again in the vault, for in came Elzevir Block. Then I held up my
hands, and cried--
'O Elzevir, save me, save me; I am not come to spy.
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