er end, working the bar about like a
lever, to grind the fulcrum into dust. Soon I had the bar so loose that
I was able to thrust it to one side, leaving a passage big enough for my
body.

I was very happy when this was done. I went back to the room to make up
a packet of food to take with me. This I thrust into an inner pocket,
before launching out up the hole. When I had cleaned up the mess of
mortar, I started up the chimney, carefully replacing the bar behind
me. Soon I was seven or eight feet above the room, trying to get at the
upper bars. I was scrambling about for a foothold, when I noticed, to
my left, an iron bar or handle, well concealed from below by projecting
bricks. I seized hold of it with my left hand, very glad of the support
it offered, when, with a dull grating noise, it slid downwards under my
weight, drawing with it the iron panel to which it was clamped. I had
come upon a secret chamber in the chimney; there at my side was an
opening big enough for a man's body. I was pretty well startled by it,
not only by the suddenness of the discovery, but from the fear I had
lest it should lead to some inhabited room, where my journey would be
brought to an end. I peered into it well, before I ventured to enter.
It was a little low room, about five feet square, lit by two loopholes,
which were concealed from outside by the great growth of ivy on the side
of the house. I clambered into it with pleasure, keeping as quiet as I
could. It was a dirty little room, with part of its floor rotten from
rain which had beaten in through the loopholes. It had not been used for
a great while. The pallet bed against the wall was covered with rotten
rags, dry as tinder. There were traces of food, who could say how
ancient, in a dish by the bed. There was a little crucifix, with a
broken neck-chain, lying close to the platter. Some priest who had used
this priest-hole years before had left it there in his hurry; I wondered
how. Something of the awe which had been upon him then seemed to linger
in the place. Many men had lain with beating hearts in that room; the
room seemed to remember. I have never been in a place which made one's
heart move like that room. Well. The priest's fears were dead as the
priest by this time. Nothing but the wreck of his dinner, perhaps the
last he ever ate, remained to tell of him, beside the broken symbol of
his belief. I shut-to the little panel-door by which I had entered, so
that I might not h