There were a dozen in all. Gathering them, no light weight, into his arms, he returned to the tower, and with two of the rods climbed up by the staples and tried one in the first hole. It fitted exactly. He fixed the second, then descended for the others. Being a sailor he knew how to avoid unnecessary expenditure of time; he slung the rest of the fittings over his shoulder with his handkerchief, and carried them up with him once for all. By their aid he mounted to the top of the tower, and found himself just below the trap-door. But it was not quite within reach. There was the hanging chain, however, coming through a hole in the floor; would that stand a tug? He made the attempt, intending to hoist himself up with one hand, and push with the other against the trap-door. But he found that when he exerted a little force the chain moved; it seemed hardly safe to trust to it. He was about to let it go when he noticed that the trap-door seemed to have risen slightly. Again he pulled at the chain, using more force. It gave to his tug, and as it descended he saw the trap-door open slowly upward. The chain at length stuck; the door was wide open, and a rough rope-ladder was hanging some ten feet below the hole. Jack found that if he eased the pressure on the chain the trap-door tended to fall back. It was a simple matter to prevent this, for, just at his hand, there was a staple to which the chain could be hooked; it was evidently intended for that purpose. To swing himself on to the ladder was the simplest of feats, and in half a minute he had climbed through the open trap and stood in the turret. "A fine old musty smell, that’s what first struck me," he said afterward. "The dust of ages; cobwebs galore. Only one window, looking seaward, and that shut fast. ’Twas stifling to a fellow used to the fresh air. There was a ramshackle old bedstead in one corner; a four-poster, with a canopy and crimson hangings; at least, they had been crimson; the dust was so thick on ’em that I couldn’t see what the color was till I’d rubbed a bit of it off. That was where the old eccentric breathed his last, I suppose; and no one thought it worth carting away. In the middle of the room was a deal table and a chair with a broken back; not another stick of furniture.