OUT OF THE CISTERN
“WHERE am I and what happened?” Tom asked himself. Rather futile and
hackneyed questions, but they were just the points Tom desired to be
informed about.
Much easier it was to reconstruct what had happened than it was to
answer the first question as to where he was. Beyond the fact that he
was in some dark place—very dark—and that it was damp and noisome, Tom
could not imagine where he had been taken.
It was coming back to him now, and he helped his dazed brain to clear by
talking aloud to himself. He realized that he was alone—or so he
judged—for his first exclamation after recovering consciousness had
brought forth no answer.
“Let’s see now,” mused the youth. “I knocked off Barsky’s wig and false
beard and saw that he had close-cropped red hair. This makes him, beyond
doubt, the scoundrel who attacked dad and the others. It also makes me
think this Barsky is a prison bird, or has been at one time.
“He got mad when I fired him, and he came at me. I remember that, but
it’s the last thing I do remember. He must have given me a crack on the
head with a black-jack and knocked me out. It happened in the little
passage near the experiment room, and no one saw it. Then he must have
tied me up and carried me here—wherever this is.”
And Tom would have given a goodly sum, just then, to know exactly where
he was. It did not seem possible that Barsky could have packed him into
an automobile and carried him far away.
“He would have been seen by some one in the office or the shops,”
reasoned Tom. “Therefore I must be hidden in some place not very far
from my own home or the office. Now where is there a locality like this
around our shops?”
Having thus considerably narrowed the inquiry, Tom further simplified it
by a process of elimination. He sensed that he was in some place below
the level of the ground. The close, stuffy atmosphere of his prison
proved that.
“And it’s damp, too,” mused Tom. “It has held water! Ah, I have it—the
old cistern under the first shop we built!”
When the Swift Construction Company was first started it was in a modest
way, with only a small shop. Beneath this Mr. Swift had had built a
large cistern for the storage of rain water, which, because of its
softness, or non-chemical quality, was needed in his experiments. Later,
when the business grew and the little old shop was abandoned, the
cistern was emptied and closed, a larger storage tank being built in
another place.
Entrance to the abandoned cistern could be gained by a trap door in the
floor of the shop, but as Tom remembered there was no ladder in the
reservoir.
“Barsky must have lowered me in here with a rope,” thought Tom. “Then he
simply dropped the cover on and ran away. It was clever of him. Now he
has time to work some of his plans, I suppose. This is all a deep-laid
plot, and it’s been in the making some time. I wish I had taken dad’s
advice and never hired that fellow! However, it’s too late to think
about that now! I must get myself out of here and stop him—that is, if
it isn’t too late!”
Tom managed to squirm to a sitting position. This made him feel better,
but it sent the blood again rushing into his sore head, and for a moment
or two he felt dizzy and sick. This passed, however, and he began to
reason matters out.
“I could shout my lungs out,” reasoned Tom, “and no one would hear me.
But, wait! I remember something. The tunnel! It’s all right! I can get
out if I can free myself!”
With the further clearing of his brain it occurred to Tom that some
years before he and his father had dug a tunnel, leading from a distant
hillside into the cistern. The tunnel passed beneath the foundations of
the old shop and the passage was used to conduct some experiments in the
action of air currents. Aeroplane models, as one knows, are tested in
what is called a wind tunnel, and the Swift underground tunnel was one
of the first of these ever made. It had not been used for a long time,
however, and the end, opening under the hill, had been boarded up.
“But if I can get loose I can walk along the tunnel and I guess I can
manage to kick down those boards,” thought Tom. “However, the question
is, can I get loose?”
At first it seemed that this must be answered in the negative. So firmly
had Barsky made the bonds that Tom tugged and strained for some time, to
his no small discomfort, without any effect.
At last, however, he felt the ropes around his hands, which had been
tied behind his back, giving a little. This encouraged him, and,
gritting his teeth to keep back involuntary exclamations of pain, he
strained harder. It was out of his power to break them, but the ropes
stretched a little, and at last, after hard work, he managed to get his
hands free.
But such was the cruel force with which the cords had been knotted and
so long had they been on the captive’s wrists that, even though his
hands were now free, he had little use of them. They were numb and
helpless. Like limbs “asleep” and, as Tom said afterward, they felt as
big as sofa cushions.
They soon, however, began to tingle as the blood resumed its
circulation, and with the sensation of pins and needles pricking his
fingers, Tom began to feel that he could use his hands.
This he did in loosening the cords around his feet, and in a few minutes
more he was able to stand up, free to move about and take up the matter
of getting out of the cistern.
It was as dark as a pocket in there, and Tom wished he had with him a
small electric flashlight. Almost always he carried one, but this time,
just when it was most needed, he was without it.
“But I guess I can go by feeling,” he told himself. “This cistern isn’t
so immense. It’s circular, and no matter where I start on the wall I’m
bound to come to the tunnel opening some time or other. I guess it’s a
mighty good thing,” grimly thought Tom, “that there’s no water in this
place. No thanks to Barsky, I guess, that there isn’t. He’d have dropped
me in just the same, I believe.”
Tom, with outstretched hands, began to grope his way about in the dark
cistern. He knew there were no holes in the floor, so he did not fear a
fall, and there was nothing with which he could collide. From the length
of time it took him to reach the wall, Tom judged that he had been lying
about in the center of the old water-container. This proved his theory
that Barsky had lowered him into it from the trap door above.
Once Tom was in contact with the circular wall of the cistern, it was an
easy matter to follow it around until he came to the tunnel opening.
“This way out!” exclaimed the young inventor grimly. “I wonder what time
it is and how long I’ve been in here. Maybe they’re looking for me up
above. And yet, perhaps they think I’m just off on one of my trips.”
Tom started into the black tunnel. It had been several years since it
had been put to use, and the youth had not entered it during all that
time. Consequently he proceeded a bit cautiously, for he did not know
but what there might be holes here and there in the floor of it.
After about five minutes of careful progress Tom felt on his face a cool
current of air.
“I’m coming to the boarded-up opening!” he exclaimed exultingly.
The boards did not fit tightly, and through one of the larger cracks Tom
caught a glint of light.
“But it’s starlight!” he cried. “It’s night! I must have been in that
cistern all day—maybe two days! Though I guess not two days or I’d feel
hungrier and thirstier than I am.”
Pushing on the boards, Tom felt them give a little, and he knew they
must have rotted away from contact with the damp earth. He pushed harder
and kicked on them, thus knocking down the barrier.
In rushed the glorious fresh air, and the young inventor saw that he was
looking out on a field some distance away from his home. It was night,
and the stars were glittering. Also, not far away from the tunnel
entrance another light was gleaming. It was the light of a lantern set
on the ground.
By the gleam of the lantern on the ground Tom could see a figure moving
about and, seemingly, digging in the earth.
“This is queer,” mused the lad. “I wonder who that is? If it’s Barsky,
maybe he’s digging to try to get at some of my secrets. Or maybe he
thinks I’m dead and he’s making a grave for me.”
Tom dismissed this gruesome thought with a laugh, and walked forward a
few paces, the better to see who was doing that queer midnight digging
by lantern light.
Some noise Tom made attracted the notice of the digger. He looked toward
the tunnel opening, and then Tom exclaimed:
“Good night! It’s Rad!”
At that moment, the colored man, with a cry of fear, made a jump,
knocking over and extinguishing the lantern while he shouted:
“De ghost! De ghost! I’s a daid darkey! I’s done seen a h’ant! Oh,
lawzy, lawzy! De ghost am after me!”