IN EVIL PLIGHT 181

wall. He still felt faint and dizzy from the effects of the
blow. Parched with thirst he tried to call out for water,
but scarce a sound came from his lips.

Gradually the room seemed to darken and become indis-
tinct, and he again lapsed into insensibility. When he
again became conscious, some one was pouring water
between his lips, and he heard a voice speaking loudly and
angrily. He had picked up a few words of Polish from
Stanislas—the names of common things, the words to use
in case he lost his way, how to ask for food and for stabling
for a horse, but he was unable to understand what was said.
He judged, however, that some one was furiously upbraiding
the man who was giving him water, for the latter now and
then muttered excuses.

“He is blowing the fellow up for having so nearly let me
slip through their fingers,” he said to himself. “ Probably
they want to question me, and find out who I have been
in communication with. They shall get nothing at present
anyhow.” He kept his eyes resolutely closed. Presently
he heard a door open and another man come in. A few
words were exchanged, and this time wine instead of water
was poured down his throat. ‘Then he was partly lifted up,
and felt a cooling sensation at the back of his head. Some
bandages were passed round it and he was laid down again.
There was some more conversation, then a door opened
and two of the men went out; the third walked back to
him, muttering angrily to himself. Charlie felt sure that
he had been moved from the place in which he had been
the evening before, his bonds had been loosed, and he was
lying on straw and not on the bare ground. Opening his
eyelids the slightest possible degree, he was confirmed in
his belief by seeing that there was much more light than
could have entered the cellar. He dared not look farther,
and in a short time fell into a far more refreshing sleep
than that he before had.