I looked round for still one more thing to hurl into the breach.

My eyes lit on a roll of carpet: I seized it by one corner meaning to drag it to the doorway, and it came undone at a touch.
That strange, that incredible pattern! Where in all the vicissitudes of a chequered career had I seen such a one before?
I stared at it in amazement under the very spears of the woodmen in the red glare of Hath's burning palace.

Then all on a sudden it burst upon me that IT WAS THE ACCURSED RUG, the very one which in response to a careless wish had swept me out of my own dear world, and forced me to take as wild a journey into space as ever fell to a man's lot since the universe was made! And in another second it occurred to me that if it had brought me hither it might take me hence.

It was but a chance, yet worth trying when all other chances were against me.

As Ar-hap's men came shouting over the barricade I threw myself down upon that incredible carpet and cried from the bottom of my heart, "I wish--I wish I were in New York!" Yes! A moment of thrilling suspense and then the corners lifted as though a strong breeze were playing upon them.