“I guess Jupe’s right,” Bob said. “We aren’t getting out of here until Duke Stefan lets us out. Who was that gypsy, Anton? I think he read our minds!”
Rudy nodded. “At least he sensed our thoughts,” he said. “Anton is the king of the few gypsies left in Varania. He is said to be a hundred years old and has strange powers no one understands. Certainly he knew the truth about the silver spider. But I am saddened, for he told Duke Stefan that he heard a bell ringing for victory. That means that our cause is hopeless. My father will be imprisoned. My friends, too. And Elena and I… ” He became silent.
Bob knew how he must be feeling. “We can’t give up,” he said stoutly. “Even if it looks hopeless. Jupe, do you have any ideas?”
“I have an idea,” Jupiter said quietly, “about getting out of here. First we have to get the guards to open the door. Then we have to overpower them.”
“Overpower two grown men?” Rudy whispered. “Without weapons? We can’t do it.”
“I’m remembering something,” Jupiter said, frowning hard. “Of course it was just a story, but it sounded as if it would work. It was in a book of mystery stories Mr. Hitchcock gave us.”
“What’s your idea, Jupe?” asked Bob eagerly.
“In the last story,” Jupiter said, “a boy and a girl are locked up just as we are. They tear up their sheets and weave them into ropes, and make nooses at both ends of the ropes. Then they get their captors to come inside the cell.”
He went on to describe how the trick worked in the story. Rudy listened with growing interest.
“It’s possible!” he said in a low voice, so he wouldn’t be heard through the tiny viewing hole in the door. “But what could we use for ropes?”
“These blankets on the cots,” Jupiter said. “They’re old and the ends are ragged. We can tear them into strips. But the strips would be strong enough so we wouldn’t need to weave them. We could use strips of blanket for rope.”
“It might work,” Rudy muttered. “One of the guards is friendly — he would only pretend to fight us. If we got the other — all right, let’s try it.”
Quietly they set to work. The blankets they had been given were indeed ragged, which was fortunate as Jupiter’s knife had been taken from him. They tore quite easily.
Slowly, very slowly, careful to make no noise, they tore off one strip about four inches wide, then another and another.
It was slow, tiring work. In places they had to use their teeth to help the tearing along, but they kept at it doggedly. Soon they had four strips. After a time they had eight, and Jupe suggested they rest.
They stretched out on the three crude cots in the cell, but they were too impatient to rest long. Soon they were at work again. Jupiter took two of the blanket strips and tied them together tightly. Then he fashioned a big slip noose in each end. He tested it around Rudy’s arms and legs, and the nooses tightened properly when pulled. Rudy was aglow with excitement and admiration.
“Brojas!” he whispered. “I think it will work. Will four be enough?”
“Enough for the guards,” Jupe whispered back.
“Let us tear some more strips to take with us,” Rudy suggested. “They will come in handy if we make it to the sewers.”
They tore eight more strips and knotted them into one long rope which Rudy wrapped around his waist.
“Now for the hard part,” Jupiter muttered. “Bob, stretch out on the cot and start to moan. Just a little at first, then louder. Rudy, put two of the nooses on the floor just inside the door, where anyone coming in will step in them.”
When all was ready, Bob began to mutter, then groan. He groaned louder, very realistically, as if in pain. After a minute one of the guards came to the door and looked in the open peephole.
“Silence!” he ordered. “Cease the noise!”
Rudy was standing by the door, while Jupe bent over Bob anxiously, holding the candle.
“He’s hurt,” Rudy said in rapid Varanian to the guard. “He bumped his head when he was caught. He has a fever now. He needs a doctor.”
“This is a trick, you young imps!”
“I tell you he’s sick!” Rudy cried. “Come in and feel his forehead. Then take him to a doctor. If you do we’ll talk. We’ll tell where the silver spider is. Duke Stefan will be pleased.”
Still the guard hesitated. Rudy grew more urgent.
“You know the Duke does not want these Americans really hurt,” he said. “The small one needs a doctor and they are ready to give back the silver spider. Act quickly, his condition may be serious!”
“We’d better see if it’s true,” said the second guard, the one who had whispered the message to Rudy.
“We don’t want to get in trouble with the Duke. You find out if he’s really sick while I guard the door. They’re just boys — we have nothing to fear.”
“Very well,” the first guard said. “I’ll see if he has a fever. But if this is a trick they’ll be sorry.”
A large key squeaked in the lock. The iron door creaked open, and the guard entered the cell.
With his first step he was caught in a waiting noose. Like a flash Rudy pulled it tight and the guard fell heavily to the floor, dropping his electric lantern. Jupiter spun around and tossed another noose over the guard’s head, and Rudy caught one of his waving arms in still a third noose.
“Help!” the guard bawled. “Help! The young devils have me!”
The second guard came rushing into the cell, but Rudy was waiting. A noose went around his neck. Another tightened around his leg. The nooses on the other end of the ropes were placed about the other guard, linking the two men tightly together.
As the first guard kicked and struggled, his movements tightened the nooses around the second guard, who fell on top of him. Rudy bent and whispered in his ear.
“Struggle hard! Keep struggling. Don’t stop.”
The guard obeyed. By struggling, both men tightened the nooses on themselves and on each other, and neither would get free. Rudy chuckled. It occurred to him that they were like two insects in a spider’s web. It was a good omen. He felt his courage and hope return.
“Quickly now!” he said. “The other guards up the corridor will hear. We must move fast. Jupiter, bring the other lantern. Follow me!”
Rudy was already moving down the corridor, toward the pitch-darkness of the lower dungeons. Bob and Jupiter raced to follow, the electric lantern making bobbing beams of light ahead of them as they ran.
They came to some stairs, ran down them, and stopped. Rudy was bent over, tugging at a big iron ring in the floor. By the light of the lantern, they saw an ancient, rusty manhole set into the stone floor.
“It’s stuck!” Rudy gasped. “Rusted. I can’t budge it.”
“Quick!” Jupiter said. “The rope. Put it through the ring and we’ll all pull.”
“Yes, of course!” Rudy whirled around, spinning out of the blanket rope wound about his waist. He pulled one end through the ring. All three boys seized the rope and pulled. At first the cover wouldn’t budge. Then, as they heard shouts and trampling feet behind them, they gave one tremendous heave.
The manhole cover flopped up and fell with a clang on its side, revealing a pitch-black hole from which came the sound of rushing water.
“I’ll go first,” Rudy gasped, pulling the rope loose. “We’ll all hold on to the rope. No chance to put the cover back.”
He lowered his feet into the hole, put the handle of the electric lantern between his teeth and, still holding the blanket rope, dropped from sight. Bob followed him. He didn’t like the look of the hole or the sound of water underneath, but he didn’t have time to hesitate.
There was an endless moment in which he was falling through nothing. Then he landed on the bed of the ancient storm sewer. It was a fall of only about six feet and he wasn’t hurt, but he would have fallen into the knee-deep water if Rudy had not caught him.
“Steady!” Rudy whispered. “Here comes Jupiter. Get out of his way.”