He strove to rise, but Brown was on top like a cat.

They rolled over and over.

Big as the man was, he had evidently now no desire but to escape; he made sprawls hither and thither to get past the Major to the door, but that tenacious person had him hard by the coat collar and hung with the other hand to a beam.

At length there came a strain in holding back this human bull, a strain under which Brown expected his hand to rend and part from the arm.

But something else rent and parted; and the dim fat figure of the giant vanished out of the cellar, leaving the torn coat in the Major's hand; the only fruit of his adventure and the only clue to the mystery.