d be sure to come and look what we were doing."

"I know," cried Scarlett. "Let's get a big bucket, and a couple of
rods, and they'll think we are going to fish."

The idea was accepted at once, and the lads marched off, rods over
shoulder, and the bucket swinging between them, its light unseen in the
broad sunshine. The place was soon reached, and, taught by experience,
they found a better way to the prostrate oak, and after a little
struggling and scratching, stood gazing down.

"Look hear, Scar," cried Fred, "if we find a better way in, we can
easily cover this place over with some old branches and fern roots,
because it must be a secret way, or it's of no use."

Scarlett quite agreed to this, and there they stood gazing up at the
arrowy beams of sunshine which shot down through the leaves. Then they
had a look down into the hole which, with its watery floor and darkness,
was anything but tempting.

"Don't look very nice, Scar, does it?"

"Not at all. Shall we give it up?"

"If we do, as soon as we get home, we shall say what cowards we were."

"Yes, I shall," replied Scarlett, "but, all the same, I don't want to go
down. Do you?"

"No."

"And you don't want me to go alone?"

"No, I don't think so. Here, Scar, don't let's give ourselves a chance
to call ourselves cowards. I'll go, if you will."

"I don't want to go, but I will, if you will. Come along."

The hesitation was gone.

"I'll go first," said Scar, "because you have been down, but I suppose
we must be careful so as not to loosen any stones."

"Very well," said Fred, rather unwillingly. "Give me the lanthorn to
hold."

The light was drawn out of the bucket, and Scarlett prepared to descend;
but this proved it longer task than was expected, for it was first
necessary to drag out several pieces of broken branch.

This being done, Scarlett looked up at his companion, who let himself
down without hesitation, and they stood together with the daylight above
them, and the narrow lugged stone passage stretching away to right and
left.

"Which way shall we go first?" asked Scarlett.

"This way," cried Fred, and his voice sounded so strange and hollow,
that as he stood there up to his knees in water, which glimmered and
shimmered on the black surface, he hesitated and wished that he had not
agreed to go.

For there before them lay a narrow path of light, ending in quite a
sharp point, and seeming to point to the end of their journey.