"Gourel!" he called. "Come! Gourel!"

Obtaining no reply, he pressed the spring of his lantern and saw Gourel lying beside him, sound asleep.

"What on earth can this pain be?" he thought. "Regular twitchings... .

Oh, why, of course, I am hungry, that's all... . I'm starving! What can the time be?"

His watch marked twenty minutes past seven, but he remembered that he had not wound it up. Gourel's watch was not going either.

Gourel had awoke under the action of the same inward pangs, which made them think that the breakfast-hour must be long past and that they had already slept for a part of the day.

"My legs are quite numbed," said Gourel, "and my feet feel as if they were on ice. What a funny sensation!" He bent down to rub them and went on: "Why, it's not on ice that my feet were, but in water... . Look, chief ... there's a regular pool near the first door... ."

"Soaked through," M. Lenormand replied. "We'll go back to the second door; you can dry yourself ..."

"But what are you doing, chief?"

"Do you think I am going to allow myself to be buried alive in this vault? ... Not if I know it; I haven't reached the age! ... As the two doors are closed, let us try to pass through the walls."

One by one he loosened the stones that stood out at the height of his hand, in the hope of contriving another gallery that would slope upwards to the level of the soil. But the work was long and painful, for in this part of the tunnel, as he perceived the stones were cemented.

"Chief ... chief," stammered Gourel, in a stifled voice... .

"Well?"

"You are standing with your feet in the water."

"Nonsense! ... Why, so I am! ... Well, it can't be helped... .

I'll dry them in the sun... ."

"But don't you see?"

"What?"

"Why, it's rising, chief, it's rising! ..."

"What's rising?"

"The water! ..."

M. Lenormand felt a shudder pass over his skin. He suddenly understood.

It was not a casual trickling through, as he had thought, but a carefully-prepared flood, mechanically, irresistibly produced by some infernal system.

"Oh, the scoundrel!" he snarled. "If ever I lay hands on him ... !"

"Yes, yes, chief, but we must first get out of this... . And, as far as I can see ..."

Gourel seemed completely prostrated, incapable of having an idea, of proposing a plan.

M. Lenormand knelt down on the ground and measured the rate at which the water was rising. A quarter, or thereabouts, of the first door was covered; and the water was half-way toward the second door.

"The progress is slow, but uninterrupted," he said "In a few hours it will be over our heads."

"But this is terrible, chief, it's horrible!" moaned Gourel.

"Oh, look here, don't come boring me with your lamentations, do you understand? Cry, if it amuses you, but don't let me hear you!"

"It's the hunger that weakens me, chief; my brain's going round."

"Bite your fist!"

As Gourel said, the position was terrible; and, if M. Lenormand had had less energy, he would have abandoned the vain struggle. What was to be done? It was no use hoping that Ribeira would have the charity to let them out. It was no use either hoping that the brothers Doudeville would rescue them, for the inspectors did not know of the existence of the tunnel. So no hope remained ... no hope but that of an impossible miracle... .

"Come, come," said M. Lenormand, "this is too silly. We're not going to kick the bucket here! Hang it all, there must be something! ... Show me a light, Gourel."

Flattening himself against the second door, he examined it from top to bottom, in every corner. There was an enormous bolt on that side, just as there probably was on the other. He unfastened the screws with the blade of his knife; and the bolt came off in his hand.

"And what next?" asked Gourel.

"What next?" he echoed. "Well, this bolt is made of iron, pretty long and very nearly pointed. Certainly, it's not as good as a pick-axe, but it's better than nothing and ..."

Without finishing his sentence, he drove the implement into the side-wall of the tunnel, a little in front of the pillar of masonry that supported the hinges of the door. As he expected, once he had passed the first layer of cement and stones, he found soft earth:

"To work!" he cried.

"Certainly, chief, but would you explain ... ?"

"It's quite simple. I want to dig round this pillar a passage, three or four yards long, which will join the tunnel on the other side of the door and allow us to escape."

"But it will take us hours; and meanwhile, the water is rising."

"Show me a light, Gourel."

"In twenty minutes, or half an hour at most, it will have reached our feet."

"Show me a light, Gourel."

M. Lenormand's idea was correct and, with some little exertion, by pulling the earth, which he first loosened with his implement, towards him and making it fall into the tunnel, he was not long in digging a hole large enough to slip into.

"It's my turn, chief!" said Gourel.

"Aha, you're returning to life, I see! Well, fire away! ... You have only to follow the shape of the pillar."

At that moment, the water was up to their ankles. Would they have time to complete the work begun?

It became more difficult as they went on, for the earth which they disturbed was in their way; and, lying flat on their stomachs in the passage, they were obliged at every instant to remove the rubbish that obstructed them.

After two hours, the work was perhaps three-quarters through, but the water now covered their legs. Another hour and it would reach the opening of the hole which they were digging. And that would mean the end!

Gourel, who was exhausted by the want of food and who was too stout to move with any freedom in that ever-narrower passage, had had to give up.