Chapter 18

XVIII

A SINGULAR EXPERIENCE

The five minutes ticked away and the watch commenced to strike the
hour's seven strokes. Did it sound the death of Rouletabille?
Perhaps not! For at the first silver tinkle they saw Rouletabille
shake himself, and raise his head, with his face alight and his
eyes shining. They saw him stand up, spread out his arms and cry:

"I have found it!"

Such joy shone in his countenance that there seemed to be an aureole
around him, and none of those there doubted that he had the solution
of the impossible problem.

"I have found it! I have found it!"

They gathered around him. He waved them away as in a waking dream.

"Give me room. I have found it, if my experiment works out. One,
two, three, four, five..."

What was he doing? He counted his steps now, in long paces, as in
dueling preliminaries. And the others, all of them, followed him
in silence, puzzled, but without protest, as if they, too, were
caught in the same strange day-dream. Steadily counting his steps
he crossed thus the court, which was vast. "Forty, forty-one,
forty-two," he cried excitedly. "This is certainly strange, and
very promising."

The others, although they did not understand, reframed from
questioning him, for they saw there was nothing to do but let him
go ahead without interruption, just as care is taken not to wake
a somnambulist abruptly. They had no mistrust of his motives, for
the idea was simply untenable that Rouletabille was fool enough to
hope to save himself from them by an imbecile subterfuge. No,
they yielded to the impression his inspired countenance gave them,
and several were so affected that they unconsciously repeated his
gestures. Thus Rouletabille reached the edge of the court where
judgment had been pronounced against him. There he had to mount
a rickety flight of stairs, whose steps he counted. He reached
a corridor, but moving away from the side where the door was
opening to the exterior he turned toward a staircase leading to the
upper floor, and still counted the steps as be climbed them. Some
of the company followed him, others hurried ahead of him. But he
did not seem aware of either the one or the other, as he walked
along living only in his thoughts. He reached the landing-place,
hesitated, pushed open a door, and found himself in a room furnished
with a table, two chairs, a mattress and a huge cupboard. He went
to the cupboard, turned the key and opened it. The cupboard was
empty. He closed it again and put the key in his pocket. Then he
went out onto the landing-place again. There he asked for the key
of the chamber-door he had just left. They gave it to him and he
locked that door and put that key also in his pocket.