“They are Spanish prayer books,” said Sam, examining them by the light of one of the windows. “They are dated fifty and sixty years back.”
“I thought I had struck rare volumes worth a few thousand dollars,” returned Darry, dryly. “Too bad! Old Flashlight must renew his wondrous search! If we only—hullo!”
Darry broke off short and Sam heard the creaking of rusty iron.
“What have you discovered now?” he asked, after an anxious pause.
“Discovered a door, as sure as you live!” exclaimed Darry, and now he was quite excited. “Hurrah, it’s daylight!”
He had pushed in a small iron door and true enough both could see a streak of sunlight beyond, streaming into a small stone passageway. In the passageway was an iron ladder, leading to the flat roof of the building. There was a trap door above, which the storms of years had moved several inches out of place.
It did not take Darry long to give Sam a hand up to the ledge, and then both boys entered the little passageway and crawled up the iron ladder. The trap door was thrown open and they came up onto the flat roof of the building. Near at hand was a sloping roof and also a square tower, all much dilapidated and covered in spots with heavy trailing vines.
“So far so good,” exclaimed Darry, as he walked over to examine the tower. “Now if we can only get to the ground from here we’ll be all right.”
“There must be another stairway to the lower floor, Darry.”
“To be sure, and it’s likely in the tower. Come on.”