There were many keys upon the oval ring, but the fair Martian maid quickly selected that which sprung the great lock at her waist, and freed she hurried toward the secret
panel.
Here they dragged the corpse of E-Med, leaving it upon the platform, and as they left the dark and forbidden closet Lan-O would have slammed to the
panel had not Tara prevented.
le Vicomte for accepting death, I returned, after giving him a word of encouragement, to my
panel, but I had made the mistake of taking a few steps while speaking and, in the tangle of the illusive forest, I was no longer able to find my
panel for certain!
Without hesitating to question those within, the ape-man threw his giant shoulder against the frail
panel, and in a shower of splintered wood he entered the cabin, dragging Rokoff after him.
"Really!" said D'Artagnan, abandoning the attempt to burst open the
panel after several ineffectual attempts, "Athos, I cannot imagine how you can talk to us in that way.
I raised the bar and shot it to the right just as the foremost of the guardsmen threw himself against the opposite side of the massive
panels.
Every few hundred yards, at particularly bad places, one came across a
panel or so of plank fencing; but they were always old and weak, and they generally leaned out over the chasm and did not make any rash promises to hold up people who might need support.
Behind the
panel the girl stood shrinking close to De Conde, her hand still in his.
A red-faced barrel of a boy did all the holding, one hand round the wrist, the other palm to palm, and his knees braced up against the
panel. Another was rendering ostentatious but ineffectual aid, and three or four others danced about in their pyjamas.
"Which was ye thinkin' on, Seth," he began--"the pretty parson's face or her sarmunt, when ye forgot the
panels?"
A carriage with arms on its
panels had stopped at the inn, and as a smart footman opened the door, a fine grey-headed military-looking man stepped out and strode hurriedly up the inn steps.
Two
panels were entirely hidden under pen-and-ink sketches, Gouache landscapes and Audran engravings, relics of better times and vanished luxury.
