"Very good," said Sir Christopher Wren, "I can at any time give you, from any place, the exact bearing of Todd's house, for I have it fixed in my mind, and can read it off from the compass plate in a moment."
They now at once made their way into the vaults, and by dint of keeping to the right hand, they avoided going much out of their course. These vaults were of great extent, and although some of them, owing to being full of the dead, had been bricked up, yet they were very easily opened, and in many cases a direct thoroughfare for considerable distances was affected.
Ever and anon the compass was appealed to, and showed them that they were approaching Todd's house.
One of the party, a well-dressed gentlemanly-looking man, now stepped forward, and said to Sir Richard—
"Here, according to the plans of the church, the vaults end."
"Then we can get no further?"
"Not an inch, Sir Richard."
"Then here commences in reality our mission, which is to try to discover some communication between the lower part of the house occupied by Sweeney Todd, and these vaults. Let us each use our utmost discrimination to affect that object."
He lighted for himself a small lantern, and commenced a rigorous search of the walls, but for some few minutes could find nothing to excite the least suspicion. At length he paused at one portion of one of the vaults, where a kind of wooden tomb had been erected close to the wall. A large piece of dirty oak was placed upright against the earth work.
"If there be any mode of leaving this vault, but the one we have entered," he said, "it is here."