They soon encountered another similar door.
"Now, Ned, I'm just going back to look at that spring."
By the knowledge thus obtained, Walter was enabled to detect a similar spring in this door, though in a different place.
They now began to perceive the light, and came to a horizontal grate, which was unfastened, and reached by only two steps. Walter flung it back, and they crawled out on their hands and knees beneath an overhanging cliff (through which the passage was cut), and into a tangle of wild vines that clung to the cliffs, weeds, brambles, and shrubs, effectually concealing the passage from casual observation.
"Whoever built this," said Ned, "knew how to make secret passages. One might pass this place all his lifetime, and never suspect it."
"It didn't do them much good," said Walter. "I'd rather live in a country where they are not needed. Ned, don't you think we ought to put this father and son in the ground?"
"I was thinking of that."
"What can we find to dig a grave with?"
"When I went after the crowbar, I found it among a lot of garden tools; there were shovels, rakes, and hoes, but the handles were all burnt away."
"No matter; we'll bury them in the old garden, where the ground is mellow; we can make a hole with the bar, and throw out the loose earth with the shovel-blades, if they have no handles."