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CHAPTER IV--THE PASSAGE
The passage in which Dick and Joanna now found themselves was narrow,
dirty, and short. At the other end of it, a door stood partly open; the
same door, without doubt, that they had heard the man unlocking. Heavy
cobwebs hung from the roof; and the paved flooring echoed hollow under
the lightest tread.
Beyond the door there were two branches, at right angles. Dick chose one
of them at random, and the pair hurried, with echoing footsteps, along
the hollow of the chapel roof. The top of the arched ceiling rose like a
whale's back in the dim glimmer of the lamp. Here and there were
spyholes, concealed, on the other side, by the carving of the cornice;
and looking down through one of these, Dick saw the paved floor of the
chapel--the altar, with its burning tapers--and stretched before it on
the steps, the figure of Sir Oliver praying with uplifted hands.
At the other end, they descended a few steps. The passage grew narrower;
the wall upon one hand was now of wood; the noise of people talking, and
a faint flickering of lights, came through the interstices; and presently
they came to a round hole about the size of a man's eye, and Dick,
looking down through it, beheld the interior of the hall, and some half a
dozen men sitting, in their jacks, about the table, drinking deep and
demolishing a venison pie. These were certainly some of the late
arrivals.
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