Chapter Twenty One.
The Black Arch.
Dreadful place indeed!
“They cannot have thrown any treasure down there,” I mentally exclaimed the next moment. “It must be somewhere recoverable.”
“Say, Mas’r Harry,” said Tom then, “hadn’t we better get back?”
“Are you afraid, Tom?” I said.
“Well, no, Mas’r Harry, I ain’t afraid; but I am nearer to being so than ever I was in my life. ’Taint fear, only one of my knees will keep going shikery-shakery, and my teeth have took it into their heads to make believe it’s cold, and they’re tapping together like the lid of a kettle in boiling time. But I ain’t a bit afraid.”
“It’s an awful-looking place, Tom,” I said, “and enough to make any one shudder.”
“’Tis that, Mas’r Harry—’tis that indeed!” said Tom earnestly. “And if I believed in ghosts and goblins I should say as this was the shop where they was made. But—but, Mas’r Harry, what’s that?”