"It looks level enough with the rest," Cuthbert said.
"Ay, lad, but we know not what lies behind this thick screen of ivy.
Thrust in that staff."
One of the woodmen began to probe with the end of a staff among the ivy.
For some time he was met by the solid ground, but presently the butt of
the staff went through suddenly, pitching him on his head, amid a
suppressed laugh from his comrades.
"Here it is, if anywhere," said Cnut, and with their billhooks they at
once began to clear away the thickly grown creepers.
Five minutes' work was sufficient to show a narrow cut, some two feet
wide, in the hillside, at the end of which stood a low door.
"Here it is," said Cnut, with triumph, "and the castle is ours. Thanks,
Cuthbert, for your thought and intelligence. It has not been used
lately, that is clear," he went on. "These creepers have not been moved
for years. Shall we go and tell the earl of our discovery? What think
you, Cuthbert?"
"I think we had better not," Cuthbert said.
"We might not succeed in getting in, as the passage may have fallen
further along; but I will speak to him and tell him that we have
something on hand which may alter his dispositions for fighting
to-morrow.
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