"Is there no way," Cnut exclaimed furiously, "by which we might creep
into this den, since we cannot burst into it openly?"
"There is a way from the castle," Cuthbert said, "for my dear lord told
me of it one day when we were riding together in the Holy Land. He said
then that it might be that he should never return, and that it were well
that I should know of the existence of this passage, which few besides
the earl himself knew of. It is approached by a very heavy slab of stone
in the great hall. This is bolted down, and as it stands under the great
table passes unnoticed, and appears part of the ordinary floor. He told
me the method in which, by touching a spring, the bolts were withdrawn
and the stone could be raised. Thence a passage a quarter of a mile
long leads to the little chapel standing in the hollow, and which, being
hidden among the trees, would be unobserved by any party besieging the
castle. This of course was contrived in order that the garrison, or any
messenger thereof, might make an exit in case of siege.
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