It therefore required very little reflection on my part to understand how complete was my captivity, and how small was the chance of my being able to deliver myself from it.
But it was something that I could see, that I could breathe freely, and that I could speak aloud, and hear, at least, the sound of my own voice. And these somehow brought with them a faint ray of hope. As I paced up and down the room--that I was permitted to go without chains showed in itself how convinced my gaolers were that I could not break free--I determined not to despair. But as the day passed wretchedly by, and night came on again, it was difficult to keep any degree of firmness in my heart.
A thing which kept constantly recurring to me was the haunting recollection of the voice I had heard, or fancied that I had heard, after I had been struck down, and was half-alive and half-dead, and so certain of nothing. Then, knowing, as I well did, what was the usual horrible fate of one taken prisoner, I could not but ponder with surprise the comparative tenderness shown me.
I had not been thrown into a noisome cell beneath the castle, or, what would have been worse still, under the bed of the stream, and left to die of madness and hunger, a prey to rats and other vermin.
Nay, I asked myself why I had not been slain outright? That, it was manifest, had not been the purpose of those who had set upon me, for, once I was down, nothing could have been easier than to despatch me.
Then, whose voice was it that I had heard? For the life of me I could not remember.
When evening was come, food and water were provided as before, but in the same obduracy of silence. The men were as speechless as mutes, beyond one saying, “Eat and drink,” and I was strangely glad and even moved to hear these simple words.
Once more being left to the solitude of my prison-chamber, a thought came, sharply shooting like an arrow, through my sombre musings. The same two men always appeared with the food; just two men, I told myself, _against one_. True, they were armed, and I was not; but might not a quick, dexterous, unexpected assault give me my opportunity? And if I could but get out of the room, could I not trust to my star, and to my knowledge of the castle, to find some way of escape? And if I failed? Well, the worst was death, and I had faced it before. And so the project grew, and took a firm hold of me.