"What!" he cried fiercely. "Have they actually done that to the poor
girl? Then they feared that she should reveal the nature of their plot,
for she had seen and heard."
"Seen and heard what?"
"Be patient; we will elucidate this mystery, and the motive of this
terrible infliction upon her. Muriel wrote to me saying that poor Elma,
her friend, had disappeared, and she feared that some evil had also
happened to her. So Oberg had sent her to his fortress--his own private
Bastille--the place to which, on pretended charges of conspiracy against
Russia, he sends those who thwart him to a living tomb."
"I have seen him, and I have defied him," I said.
"You have! Man alive! be careful. He's not a fellow who sticks at
trifles," said Jack warningly.
"I don't fear," I replied. "Elma's enemies are also mine."
"Then I take it, old fellow, that notwithstanding her affliction, you
are actually in love with her?"
"I intend to rescue, and to marry her," I answered quite frankly.
"But first we must tear aside this veil of mystery and ascertain all the
facts concerning her," he said.
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