Nick Carter did not fall far, yet far enough to jar him from head to foot and smash to fragments the chair on which he was seated.
Nick landed in about a foot of water, moreover, drenching him to the skin, yet the chill of which served instantly to revive him.
He found himself in almost total darkness. The only light came through a c***k a foot or more above his head. It served to reveal four bare, wet walls of planking, however, also the floor through which he had been precipitated, with the trapdoor now grimly closed.
Nick had heard the crash of it when Ardley closed and secured it, also the mocking roar of the monstrous rascal, and it took Nick only a moment to determine in what sort of a trap he was confined.
He could hear the gurgling of the water in the mill sluice, separated fro
