“Noa, maister, I were not. That were in Goodman Prout’s time. But her leddyship will be loikely i’ t’ vault.”
Saying this, the sexton took a key from his pocket and unlocked a door on the right-hand side of the chancel, revealing a narrow flight of stone steps leading into the crypt below.
All the party approached the opening.
“Wynnette, my dear, you had better not venture down. The air must be very bad,” said Mr. Force.
“Nay, maister, none so bad as you think. There be many a gentleman’s cellar far worse. There be windys—open windys—wi’ airn bars on each side of the wall, and on each end of the wall even wi’ the ground, and though they be some of ’em well choked up, yet for all that there be enough o’ them open to keep the air fresh i’ the vault. There be na fear, maister,” said the sexton.
Mr. Force, standing at the head of the steps leading down into the vault, felt for himself that there was no fear of foul air; the atmosphere was as fresh, though a little damper, than that of the church above.
The sexton unhooked a lantern that hung on a nail within the door, took a match from his pocket, lighted the little lamp and walked before the visitors down the steps.
The vault occupied all the space under the church, and it was provided with stone tables ranged around the four walls.
The place was dimly visible by the daylight which struggled through the ivy that half choked up the barred windows. This was strongest from the west, from which the declining sun shot rays of golden light through bars and ivy leaves, whose shadows flickered dimly on the stone tables and on the leaden caskets they supported.
But it needed the additional light of the lantern by which to read the inscription on the latter.