The Viking's Skull

by John R. Carling

"Merci! But are you not promising too much? Is not treasure-trove the property of the Crown?"

"Provided that the Crown hears of the discovery."

"Fie, Mr. Breakspear! you would corrupt my honesty."

"I can depart now with a hopeful heart for to-night's work. I shall have but little difficulty in penetrating to the interior of the hillock. We have no need to mark the entrance. Nature has already done it for us."

He pointed to a cluster of white flowers growing upon the side of the hillock. Beatrice had no sooner set eyes upon them than an expression of surprise stole over her face.

"Do you know the name of this flower?" she said. "It is the vernal mandrake."

"What? The mandragora of the ancients?—the plant that played so potent a factor in classic witchcraft?"

"The same."

Idris gazed with considerable interest upon the pale mysterious plant around which so many weird superstitions have gathered.