The expedition was so strange, so unlike anything she had ever known before, that Lorelie began to wonder whether the whole scene was not a dream. It was difficult to believe that the earl, so smiling and courteous, could really entertain the black design of which she suspected him.
At the end of the Picture Gallery they reached that little lumber-room which Godfrey Rothwell had so long hesitated to enter on that memorable night when tracking Ivar to the vault. Making his way to the hearth the earl stood in the wide space beneath the mantel, and lifting his hand within the chimney he touched what Lorelie judged was a hidden spring, for his action was immediately followed by a faint creaking of pulleys and ropes, and then the perpendicular slab forming one side of the fireplace began slowly to descend, revealing behind it an empty space.
"The secret way to our crypt," remarked the earl.
He passed through the entrance. Ivar, who had not spoken one word since leaving the dining-hall, followed. Lorelie went last.
She looked about her. The light carried by Ivar faintly illumined the place. She was standing in a narrow passage, paved, walled, and roofed, with stone. Its length could not be ascertained by the eye, for it stretched away indefinitely in the gloom.
The earl began to manipulate the machinery, and the stone slab slowly ascended till its lower end rested upon the hearth again. Lorelie, attentive to his action, grasped with quick eye the principle of the mechanism. Such knowledge would be useful in the event of her having to return alone.
All communication with the outer world was now cut off. She was completely at the mercy of the two men, and though this was only what she had foreseen, yet none the less the sudden realization of the fact caused a certain chilling of her high courage.
The order of their march was now changed: they walked abreast: Lorelie in the centre, the earl on her right, Ivar, still silent, on her left.
Though apparently staring about with interest and curiosity Lorelie in reality never took her eyes from the earl. It might have been simply the effect of the flickering light, but in her opinion his face had an exultant and sinister expression. She became more than ever on her guard, and any sudden movement on his part caused her right hand to seek her dress pocket in which a loaded revolver lay concealed.