THE SECRET DOOR.
Smithkin escaped not a moment too soon, for as he dropped in a heap
beside Harry, a hundred angry Gnomes were brandishing their spears
beneath. Smithkin was no coward when he had half a chance to fight and
defend himself, and he brandished his own spear in return, and yelled
defiance at the constantly increasing crowd.
The piece of furniture on which the besieged ones were standing,
looked like a long wardrobe, and for convenience sake we shall call
it a wardrobe, although really it had been used by the Pin Elves as a
place for keeping their spears when they were not in use. It seemed
low to Harry, but it was too high for even the tallest of the Gnomes
to reach the top with his spear; so, for the present, the boy and his
two companions were secure from attack. Fortunately, the Pin Elves and
Gnomes are unable to hurl their spears at an enemy. They can fight at
close quarters only, by thrusting with the weapon.
Kitey, being unarmed, was directed by Harry to stand back against the
wall and keep a sharp lookout over the Hall, in order to prevent any
sudden surprises.
The King of the Gnomes by this time was seated upon the throne, and on
each side of him sat Cattisack and Grumpy. The three were earnestly
talking together.
“Prince,” Kitey said in a low voice, so as not to be heard by the
Gnomes below, “the King of the Gnomes seems to be consulting with our
former King and the Lord of the Safety-Pin. Now he is giving orders to
his attendants, and they are running down the Hall. Look, Prince! they
are bringing a table and chairs, and are going to climb up here!”
“Don’t get excited, old man,” said Harry. “I’ve been waiting for them
to do something of the kind.”
The boy stood calmly with his right hand in his coat-pocket while the
Gnomes dragged a table up to the wardrobe and clambered upon it.
“Now, Smithkin!” he cried, “poke them with the butt end of your spear!”
And at the same time he drew forth his little pop-gun and fired
pointblank at the foremost Gnome. The cork struck the fellow between
the eyes, and over he went backwards, knocking half a dozen of the
other Gnomes off the table as he fell. The unexpected report of the
pistol, and the disastrous result of the shot, threw the Gnomes on
Smithkin’s side off their guard, and with a quick, vigorous thrust of
his long spear-handle, the soldier knocked four more from the table.
Quick as a flash Harry recovered the cork, which was attached to the
pistol by a cord, and setting the spring, he pushed the cork in as
tight as he could, and fired again. The report was so loud that the few
Gnomes still upon the table tumbled off from sheer fright.
The King of the Gnomes, seeing that this attempt had failed, gave
orders to try another plan for dislodging Harry and his companions.
Soon a number of Gnomes began bringing in armfuls of wood, which they
piled near the wardrobe.
“They are going to burn us out!” cried Kitey.
[Illustration: ON THE WARDROBE.]
“Don’t worry!” said Harry. “They can’t do it.”
And so it turned out, for whenever a Gnome ventured near and endeavored
to place some wood against the foot of the wardrobe, Harry would lean
over and extend his right hand, “pop!” would go the pistol, and over
the Gnome would tumble.
Perhaps if a large number of them had rushed forward simultaneously,
they might have accomplished their purpose; but they were afraid of the
mysterious little weapon, that made such a terrible noise and knocked
them senseless at a distance of several feet, and only a bold fellow
now and then dared venture within range.
Finally, a messenger came with new orders from the King, and the
Gnomes began laying the wood in a semicircle about eight feet from the
wardrobe and extending from the wall on one side around to the wall on
the other side.
“They’re going to smoke us out!” exclaimed Smithkin. “Hit them with
your magic weapon, Prince!”
Harry tried to do so, but the string was too short to allow the cork to
reach any of them.
“Never mind,” said he; “that little pile of wood is too far away to
hurt us. There won’t be smoke enough from it.”
Smithkin shook his head dolefully. “Don’t laugh until they are done!”
he said.
Harry did laugh contemptuously, however, while the Gnomes set fire to
the wood; but his laugh soon faded away as some of the Gnomes sprinkled
a powder on the flames, and immediately a dense, black, stifling smoke
slowly arose and curled towards them from all sides.
“I say, boys, they have us this time!” he cried in dismay. “We can’t
stand this; we’ll have to jump down and fight in about half a minute.”
“Look here, Prince Harry,” said Smithkin, beckoning and pointing down;
“here is a door in the wall close to my end of the wardrobe; perhaps we
can slip through it and escape.”
“I don’t see any door,” said Harry, stooping down, and looking at the
place indicated.
“You can’t see it,” replied the soldier, “but it’s there, and if you
will quietly lift me down and give me your door-pin, I will open it.”
Just then a thick cloud of smoke enveloped them, and set them coughing
and choking, so Harry hastily lowered himself to the floor and lifted
his two companions down. The curtain of smoke completely screened them
from the Gnomes on the other side of the fire.
Smithkin knew the exact spot in which to insert the door-pin,—for when
he was commander of the King’s body-guard, it was often his duty to use
the various secret doors and passages of which the common Pin Elves
were ignorant,—and the three comrades quietly passed into an outer
passage and closed the door behind them, without any one in the Hall
knowing of their escape.
In perfect silence the soldier led them onward, until they found
themselves in the chamber under the rock in Central Park.
“Now, Prince,” said Smithkin, “you know where we are. What are your
orders?”
“You and Kitey wait here a moment,” replied Harry, “and I will go
around through the Passage of the Toad and see what the Gnomes are
doing.”
The boy hurried away and soon came to the spot in the main passage
where the toad was tied up.
“Poor little hoppy!” he cried, “you’re having a hard time of it. I’ll
set you free from that old rag, at any rate.”
Having untied the cloth in which the toad was imprisoned, he ran on
to the end of the passage, mounted the steps, and gently opened the
trap-door on a crack. Just as he did so, he heard the King of the
Gnomes say, “Extinguish the fire! The knaves must be suffocated by this
time.”
Harry peeped through, and saw the Gnomes putting out the semicircle
of flame. Gradually the black smoke cleared away, and the Gnomes
discovered to their amazement that the top of the wardrobe was empty.
“Glumdozo!” roared the King, “the varlets have escaped!”
Search was made inside of the wardrobe and all around it, but of course
it was in vain.
At this point Cattisack, the former King of the Pin Elves, leaned over
and whispered to the King of the Gnomes, “Your Majesty, I think they
must have escaped through a secret door near where they were.”
Harry heard the whisper, for he could almost touch the two Kings from
his place of concealment.
The King of the Gnomes forthwith commanded his soldiers to institute
a strict search for the fugitives, but before the searchers left the
Hall, the boy had softly closed the trap-door, and was on his way back
to Smithkin and Kitey.
“Quick!” said he to the soldier, as he ran up to them, “lead the way at
once to the prison.”
Smithkin did so, and they reached the room before any of the Gnomes
appeared.
“Now,” said Harry, taking from his pocket the lantern-box which Kitey
had loaned him, “open the trap-door, and we’ll go down and rescue Wamby
and the men with him.”
“Oho!” exclaimed Smithkin, “so that is your plan.”
They quickly made their way over the course Harry and Wamby had
travelled during the boy’s former visit, and when they came to the edge
of the lake they turned off and proceeded to the chamber with the great
trap-door. Opening the door that led to the stairs under the incline,
they ran down the long flight of stairs and emerged in the dungeon
where Wamby and the rest were confined.
A joyous shout greeted them: “Hurrah! here’s the Prince! Here’s little
Kitey! Here’s old Smithkin!”
Harry glanced around, and a disappointed look came into his face. “You
are not armed!” he exclaimed.
“No,” Wamby made reply, “we found the armory without any trouble, but
it was empty; the Gnomes had removed all of the weapons, so we were
unable to arm ourselves. Then, as we were on our way to join you and
your men, the rascally Gnomes dumped us down here.”
“Yes,” said Harry, “I know about that. I am sorry, though, that you are
unarmed, for that leaves us with only a thousand men ready to fight,
and we cannot conquer the Gnomes with that number. However, let us get
out of this hole, and join the thousand men in the antechamber above.
Come quietly; there may be Gnoman spies about.”
The poor fellows were glad enough to be released from their prison, and
when they reached the antechamber adjoining the Grand Reception Hall
they were warmly welcomed by their thousand comrades.
Leaving Kitey to tell the elves all that had thus far happened, Harry
drew Wamby and Smithkin aside for consultation.
“What is there to be done now?” he asked, after he had given Wamby a
brief history of what had befallen them. “We have but a thousand men
that are armed, and even they are practically useless, for the door
into the Hall is bolted on the inside.”
“You might go around through the Passage of the Toad,” said Wamby, “and
see what is taking place in the Hall.”
“How can I get there?” Harry inquired.
“Why,” replied Wamby, “one of the small, branching passages runs from
this antechamber. The door is over in that corner. When the passage
was built, the intention was to afford means of escape in various
directions, so the small passages branch out on all sides.”
“Then I’ll go down at once,” said Harry. “You quietly tell your men
to be prepared for anything that may happen, and to be ready to obey
without questioning any orders I may give.”
When the boy reached the trap-door behind the throne, the King of the
Gnomes was on the point of receiving a report from his men, who had
been searching for the three fugitives.
Harry silently chuckled as he heard the King demand, “Have you found
the fugitives?”
“If it please Your Majesty,” was the answer, “we have looked everywhere
and can discover no traces of them whatever.”
“Hum! hah!” growled the King.
He stroked his beard for several minutes, and then arose, saying,
“Prepare the tables for a banquet on our return in half an hour.”
Having given this command, he left the Hall with his attendants, and
his example was shortly followed by all of the Gnomes except the
servants who were to prepare the banquet. These began to put the tables
in order, and then presently brought in dishes of all kinds of tempting
food.
The sight made Harry’s mouth water, for he had had nothing to eat for a
long time and was ravenously hungry.
“I’ll run out and capture some victuals again when the Hall is empty,”
he said to himself, smacking his lips in anticipation. But as he
waited, a picture of Wamby and the other Pin Elves in the antechamber
rose before him. “Poor little beggars!” he thought. “They are more
hungry than I, and I’m going to give them a share of the food, even if
I get caught by the Gnomes.”
When all had been prepared, the servants withdrew as before, and left
the Hall empty. This was the opportunity for which Harry was looking.
He darted forth from his hiding-place to the door of the antechamber,
drew back the bolts, and called to the Pin Elves, “A hundred of you
that are unarmed, come quickly!”
Leading them to the tables, the boy said, “Each one of you take a dish
of food and run back with it.”
They did so right willingly, and in a trice the tables were entirely
cleared of provisions. Harry secured a dish of food for himself, and
having bolted the door again behind the Pin Elves, in order to throw
the Gnomes off the scent, he ran back to his own place of concealment
beneath the trap-door in the Passage of the Toad.
The King of the Gnomes was in a towering passion when he came in and
found that his dinner had again mysteriously disappeared. He banished
all of the servants to the mines, greatly to Harry’s delight, for every
Gnome thus banished weakened the power of the Gnomes and added to the
strength of the Pin Elves. Then the King ordered other servants to
prepare a fresh meal, and he and his attendants left the Hall once more.
“Ho, ho! old fellow!” cried Harry to himself, shaking his fist at the
King as he passed out; “I have a scheme this time that will upset your
plans entirely, and will probably send you below, where you belong.
Just you wait awhile, and I’ll furnish sauce, and perhaps guests also,
for your dinner!”