When I was found, those who came upon my body would know that I died struggling, died as a man should, facing fate with a smile, with hands gripped in the contest.

The resolution served--it was a spur to my pride, instantly driving away every haunting shadow of evil.

Yet where should I turn?
To what end should I devote my energies?
It was useless to climb those stairs again.
But there must be a way out.

It was impossible to conceive that the old-time Mortimer--the stern frontiersman who had built this refuge from possible Indian attack--had made merely a hole in which to hide.

That would have been insanity, for, with the house above aflame, he would have been cooked to a crisp.