“THE CASTLE OF THE HUMAN SNAKE”
The driver had driven the car under a large and heavily pillared shelter
at one side of the chateau, and he now honked his horn, evidently as a
signal to someone inside. Presently a burly Prussian servant came out,
carrying a powerful hand searchlight, with which he supplemented the
front lights of the automobile. The rain continued to come down in
torrents and the lightning to flash and the thunder to clap heavily.
However, the travelers were well protected under the shelter, so that
there was no need to hurry inside.
Phil would have broken loose and made a dash into the uncomfortable
storm and the pitch-dark forest if there had been any opportunity for
him to do so. But, evidently, “the count” anticipated that he might
attempt such a move and kept a firm hold on one arm of his prisoner. The
servant also, well schooled in his duties, took hold of the other arm of
the boy, who was thus led through a massive entrance into the building.
It was a dingy looking place into which Phil was conducted. Undoubtedly
this appearance was a result of two principal conditions, for, with
quite as little doubt, this chateau had been kept in excellent condition
before the war. First, the light was poor, being supplied principally
with oil lamps and candles. The electric flash-light, in the hands of
the servant, when switched on, caused the other lights to fade into
insignificance. Second, the number of servants available for the
maintenance of so large an establishment must have been small indeed.
But an unmistakable atmosphere of luxury, in spite of its mustiness,
almost blew into Phil’s face as he entered. A breath of rich tapestries
and soft velvety rugs met in sharp contrast the gust of wet-woods wind
that forced itself in past the midnight arrivals. But for this contrast,
perhaps the neglected richness of the interior would not have impressed
itself so noticeably on the prisoner’s olfactory sense.
The room into which Phil was first inducted was a large reception hall,
which opened upon two other apartments, one to the left and one straight
ahead, through wide high-arched doorways, partly closed with heavy
portieres. The boy was led straight forward through the latter doorway
and into a large room whose rich decorations and furniture were only
vaguely discernible by the light of two or three candles on a deep
mantel over a great fireplace.
Here Topoff gave instructions in German to the servant and left the
latter alone to proceed with the prisoner. Phil next found himself being
conducted through a long hall and then down a flight of stairs to a
basement floor. There he was thrust into a dark room and the door was
closed and locked.
It was a most unceremonious proceeding, but Phil decided that he could
hardly expect anything else under the circumstances. He forgot for the
moment that he was wretchedly hungry, in his eagerness and anxiety to
learn the character of his quarters. He began his examination of the
place by getting down on his hands and knees. Then he realized for the
first time that he was on a floor of cold, hard clay, like that of a
deep cellar.
Suddenly his investigation was aided by a brilliant flash of lightning,
which afforded him a good view of the floor of his prison. There was
nothing of particular interest in it except a board platform at the
farther side of the room, probably built there as a dry elevation for
vegetables harvested from lands of the estate. No such articles of raw
food, however, were on it now.
“That’ll be a much better place for me to sleep on than this
pneumonia-and-rheumatism floor,” Phil muttered. “I think I’ll go over
there and try to sleep. I wonder if I can.”
He had good reason to doubt his ability to forget his physical and
mental distress in slumber, and the effort he made was therefore the
more courageous. As he lay down on his back, another flash of lightning
illuminated the room, so that he had now a fairly complete picture in
his mind as to the size and character of his prison.
It was circular, like a huge cistern, and deep. A curved wall of masonry
arose on all sides. Midway between floor and ceiling and far above his
reach were two long, narrow, deep windows. The diameter of the
cylindrical room was twenty-five or thirty feet.
“A regular donjon, or dungeon, of a mediaeval castle,” Phil said to
himself. He almost uttered the words aloud, just to satisfy his
curiosity as to how his voice would sound, but a dread of the awe-thrill
that would probably follow controlled the impulse.
“I’m going to do my best to go to sleep,” he resolved. “Goodness
knows, I need it bad enough, and maybe this place won’t seem so
dreadful in the morning. I wonder if they’ll give me anything to eat
then, or if starvation is a concomitant of that villain’s sweating
machinery. Concomitant is a good word under the circumstances, I
guess. It ought to go well with a donjon of a castle keep. Just to
think! the position ’u’d be reversed and I’d have that monster of big
circumference in limbo behind the Marine lines at Chateau Thierry if
that tall slim piece of a wall hadn’t toppled over on top o’ me. But
instead of his being under guard at Chateau Thierry, I’m in a cellar
tomb in Chateau—Chateau—what’ll I call it? Oh, yes, I’ll call it
Chateau Boaconstrictor, or the Castle of the Human Snake.”
His dread of what the near future might have in store for him being thus
mollified somewhat by his damp-dungeon serpentine wit, Phil dozed
several minutes over the grewsome idea and then fell hungrily asleep.