“Oh no, she never gets up till ten o’clock. She can work in bed as well as anywhere—and it saves a fire. Oh, if I could only put an end to her stitch, stitch, stitch; but she will do it, and, in spite of her old eyes, her work is exquisite; mine is nothing like so fine—or so saleable!”
By eight o’clock the next morning D’Arcy was hard at work. Bridget damped the paper, which was gradually peeled off, and revealed a door—a locked door.
D’Arcy shook it gently, then violently; the result was a rattling and jingling within, and he exclaimed:
“A cupboard—not a door. I’ll run out and borrow a bunch of old keys.”
After much humouring and buttering—oil not being obtainable—a key yielded, and a door, which had been closed for eighty years, opened with a reluctant creak.
The first discovery was a thin layer of grey dust, the next a vast collection of silver, glass, and china; the shelves were crowded. Bridget gave a stifled scream, and Denis recognised that they had come upon a wonderful treasure-trove.
“Why, it must be Madame’s green Sèvres, that Granny talks about—Louis the Sixteenth gave it to great grandfather Doyne, when he was in Paris; it’s worth thousands.” And Bridget took Denis by the arm and shook him. “Think of it—thousands!”
“Easy, easy, Bridge, or I’ll drop a thousand! There seems to be no end of stuff here; that crafty old Madame hid all these valuables before her death, and left no sign.”
“Not as far as we know. Now I’ll fetch the tray, and we will carry everything into the parlour, and set them out, and then call Granny; she won’t believe her poor dear old eyes!”
It took a considerable time to empty the precious cupboard, but at last the whole of its contents were arranged on the round table, the sideboard, and the lesser objects in imposing rows along the floor.