I knew why the iron tree had returned, in this third change of scene!...
The iron tree was waiting for me!...
But, as I stared at the Punjab lasso, I saw a thing that made me
start so violently that M. de Chagny delayed his attempt at suicide.
I took his arm. And then I caught the pistol from him...and then
I dragged myself on my knees toward what I had seen.
I had discovered, near the Punjab lasso, in a groove in the floor,
a black-headed nail of which I knew the use. At last I had discovered
the spring! I felt the nail....I lifted a radiant face to
M. de Chagny....The black-headed nail yielded to my pressure....
And then....
And then we saw not a door opened in the wall, but a cellar-flap
released in the floor. Cool air came up to us from the black
hole below. We stooped over that square of darkness as though over
a limpid well. With our chins in the cool shade, we drank it in.
And we bent lower and lower over the trap-door. What could there
be in that cellar which opened before us? Water? Water to drink?
I thrust my arm into the darkness and came upon a stone and another
stone...a staircase.
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