The thing was done in ten minutes.  Mazeroux cleared the opening, caught hold of Don Luis by the legs and pulled him out of his hole.

“Oh, dear, oh dear!” he moaned, in a voice full of pity.  “What a position, Chief!  How did you manage it all?  Yes, I see:  you must have dug down, where you lay, and gone on digging—­for more than a yard!  And it took some pluck, I expect, on an empty stomach!”

When Don Luis was seated in his bedroom and had swallowed a few bits of bread and drunk what he wanted, he told his story: 

“Yes, it took the devil’s own pluck, old man.  By Jingo! when a chap’s ideas are whirling in his head and he can’t use his brain, upon my word, all he asks is to die?  And then there was no air, you see.  I couldn’t breathe.  I went on digging, however, as you saw, went on digging while I was half asleep, in a sort of nightmare.  Just look:  my fingers are in a jelly.  But there, I was thinking of that confounded business of the explosion and I wanted to warn you at all costs, and I dug away at my tunnel.  What a job!  And then, oof!  I felt space at last!

“I got my hand through and next my arm.  Where was I?  Why, over the telephone, of course!  I knew that at once by feeling the wall and finding the wires.  Then it took me quite half an hour to get hold of the instrument.  I couldn’t reach it with my arm.

“I managed at last with a piece of string and a slip-knot to fish up the receiver and hold it near my mouth, or, say, at ten inches from my mouth.  And then I shouted and roared to make my voice carry; and, all the time, I was in pain.  And then, at last, my string broke....  And then—­and then—­I hadn’t an ounce of strength left in my body.  Besides, you fellows had been warned; and it was for you to get yourselves out of the mess.”

He looked at Mazeroux and asked him, as though certain of the reply: 

“The explosion took place, didn’t it?”

“Yes, Chief.”

“At three o’clock exactly?”

“Yes.”

“And of course M. Desmalions had the house cleared?”

“Yes.”

“At the last minute?”

“At the last minute.”

Don Luis laughed and said: 

“I knew he would wait about and not give way until the crucial moment.  You must have had a bad time of it, my poor Mazeroux, for of course you agreed with me from the start.”

He kept on eating while he talked; and each mouthful seemed to bring back a little of his usual animation.

“Funny thing, hunger!” he said.  “Makes you feel so light-headed.  I must practise getting used to it, however.”

“At any rate, Chief, no one would believe that you have been fasting for nearly forty-eight hours.”

“Ah, that comes of having a sound constitution, with something to fall back upon!  I shall be a different man in half an hour.  Just give me time to shave and have a bath.”

When he had finished dressing, he sat down to the breakfast of eggs and cold meat which Mazeroux had prepared for him; and then, getting up, said: