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THE BOY GUIDE. 39
But he saw that the roof was even with the chimney, so no ladder
could go down it. .
“They must hook a rope-ladder into the chimney in some way,’’
he muttered, and he ran his hand around inside to find the hook,
determined to tear his clothing in strips and make a rope, so that
he might escape.
* Ah!” he said, as his hand touched a piece of iron.
* A ladder inside,’”’ he cried, joyously, as he felt rods of iron going
down as faras he could reach. Instantly he lowered himself into
the chimney and commenced the descent.
Feeling with his feet he found the rods, two feet apart, and down
he went into the gloom.
One thing was certain, the chimney was not used as a smoke-
conductor, for there was no soot in it. Down, down he went into
the darkness, only a shadowy light showing the opening in the top
of the chimney. .
He had counted twenty rods, and so knew that he must have
descended some forty feet.
Then his feet touched bottom, and turning, he saw the glimmer of
a light throngh a crack.
Stooping, he gazed through the crack and looked out into a room
dimly lighted, the gas being turned down low.
He saw that a fire-board hid the open chimney in which he stood,
and moving it out he beheld the interior of the room distinctly.
There were two windows, one oneither side of the fire-place, and he
heard the wind rattling the sashes furiously, and the rain pattering
viciously against the panes of glass.
_ There was a stove before him, brut it was evidently there for show,
as the smoke-stack entered the chimney, yet no soot was in it, which
proved that a fire could not have been lightedin it. __
A table with books on it, some pictures on the walls, a clothes-press,
and over on one side of a door was a bed, while horrors! there was a
snan init!
The occupant of the bed was asleep, that was certain, his face
turned toward the wall, as Will could see by the dimly-burning gas-jet
over the table.
_ To escape, the boy saw that his only chance was to get out of his
iding-place, cross the room, unlock the door, and thus get out; but
when out of the room would he be free ?
This was the startling question he asked himself, as he grasped the
fireguard to push it one side, determined to at once make the venture,
for he did not know at what moment he might find a pursuer coming
down the chimney on his track. -
CHAPTER XV.—TuE Boy Guipz.
Gene reader can fully appreciate the peril of Will when they now |
“ah what was behind him, and that he had a room, unknown to him,
and with an occupant asleep in it, to cross, before he got ont,
* 4