His breath began to come quickly, his knees shook.

He heard his companion gasp--human nerves could stand it no longer.

And then, just as he felt that, come what might, he must plunge his pike into the darkness, and settle the question, the shuffling sound came anew and steadied him, and he set his teeth and waited--waited still.
But nothing happened, nothing moved.

Again the seconds, almost the minutes passed, and the deep note of the alarm-bell swelled louder and heavier, filling all the air, all the night, all the world, with its iron tongue--setting the tower reeling, the head swimming.

In spite of himself, in spite of the fact that he knew his life hung on his vigilance, his thoughts wandered; wandered to Anne, alone and defenceless in that hell below him, from which such wild sounds were beginning to rise; to his own fate if he and Marcadel got the worst; to the advantage a light properly shaded would have given them, had they had it.