But there was a stout oak chair by the bedside, and at a pinch its legs might serve.
We could do nothing but wait to see what their move would be, and that waiting, with the gloomiest of prospects in front, was as long and dismal a time as any I have known.
It was just beginning to get light when a tap came on the door, and the voice of the villainous old miller-- "Your breakfast is ready.

We should start in half an hour." "Hel-lo ?" I asked, in as sleepy a fashion as I could make it.
He repeated his message, and Le Marchant, with his ear against the door, nodded confirmation of our fears.

The breakfast we were invited to consisted of muskets and cutlasses and hard blows.
It was Le Marchant's very reasonable anger at this treacherous usage that saved us in a way we had not looked for.

But possibly there was in him some dim idea of chances of escape in what might follow.

Chance there was none if we walked into the next room or tried the window.
Our comfortable bed consisted of sweet soft hay inside the usual covering.
He suddenly ripped this open, tore out the hay in handfuls and flung it under the bedstead, then pulled out his flint and steel and set it ablaze.
The room was full of smoke in a moment, and we heard startled cries from the outer room.