第156章

On the day after the last triad in the housekeeper's parlour, as Donal sat in the schoolroom with Davie--about noon it was--he became aware that for some time he had been hearing laborious blows apparently at a great distance: now that he attended, they seemed to be in the castle itself, deadened by mass, not distance. With a fear gradually becoming more definite, he sat listening for a few moments.

"Davie," he said, "run and see what is going on."

The boy came rushing back in great excitement.

"Oh, Mr. Grant, what do you think!" he cried. "I do believe my father is after the lost room! They are breaking down a wall!"

"Where?" asked Donal, half starting from his seat.

"In the little room behind the half-way room--on the stair, you know!"

Donal was silent: what might not be the consequences!

"You may go and see them at work, Davie," he said. "We shall have no more lessons this morning.--Was your papa with them?"

"No, sir--at least, I did not see him. Simmons told me he sent for the masons this morning, and set them to take the wall down. Oh, thank you, Mr. Grant! It is such fun! I do wonder what is behind it!

It may be a place you know quite well, or a place you never saw before!"

Davie ran off, and Donal instantly sped to a corner where he had hidden some tools, thence to lady Arctura's deserted room, and so to the oak door. He remembered seeing another staple in the same post, a little lower down: if he could get that out, he would drive it in beside the remains of the other, so as to hold the bolt of the lock: if the earl knew the way in, as doubtless he did, he must not learn that another had found it--not yet at least! As he went down, every blow of the masons pounding at the wall, seemed in his very ears.

He peeped through the press-door: they had not yet got through the wall: no light was visible! He made haste to restore things--only a stool and a few papers--to their exact positions when first he entered. Close to him on the other side of the partition, shaking the place, the huge blows were falling like those of a ram on the wall of a besieged city, of which he was the whole garrison. He stepped into the press and drew the door after him: with his last glance behind him he saw, in the faint gleam of light that came with it, a stone fall: he must make haste: the demolition would go on much faster now; but before they had the opening large enough to pass, he would have done what he wanted! With a strong piece of iron for a lever, he drew the staple from the post, then drove it in astride of the bolt, careful to time his blows to those of the masons. That done, he ran down to the chapel, gathered what dust he could sweep up from behind the altar and laid it on its top, restored on the bed, with its own dust, a little of the outline of what had lain there, dropped the slab to its place in the floor of the passage, closed the door of the chapel with some difficulty because of its broken hinge, and ascended.

The sounds of battering had ceased, and as he passed the oak door he laid his ear to it: some one was in the place! the lid of the bureau shut with a loud bang, and he heard a lock turned. The wall could not be half down yet: the earl must have entered the moment he could get through!

Donal hastened up, and out of the dreadful place, put the slab in the opening, secured it with a strut against the opposite side of the recess, and closed the shutters and drew the curtains of the room; if the earl came up the stair in the wall, found the stone immovable, and saw no light through any chink about its edges, he would not suspect it had been displaced!

He went then to lady Arctura.

"I have a great deal to tell you," he said, "but at this moment I cannot: I am afraid of the earl finding me with you!"

"Why should you mind that?" said Arctura.

"Because I think he is suspicious about the lost room. He has had a wall taken down this morning. Please do not let him see you know anything about it. Davie thinks he is set on finding the lost room: