"Discover! My dear Mr. Secretary, this place is fairly alive with ghosts, and sliding panels, and revolving pictures; and there's a great tiled, underground passage leading off from the kitchens into the country somewhere, which everyone is afraid to explore, and which the last incumbent had nailed up because it made him nervous." "I hope you've reserved a nice cork-screwy staircase with a mouldering skeleton at the top, for my especial discovery and delectation." "First come, first served," she replied; "but there's something in this very hall that's worthy of your mettle, the greatest prize puzzle a hostess ever possessed, only I shan't forgive you if you solve it, for it's one of the standard attractions of the house, and has amused guests innumerable." "Trot it out forthwith. I'm all impatience." "I shall do nothing of the kind unless you treat it with more respect. An oaken door, studded with silver nails, that has not condescended to open itself for at least two centuries, cannot be 'trotted out'!" "I beg its humble pardon," said the Secretary, approaching the door and putting his shoulder against it. "It's as steady as a rock." "Oh, yes. Nothing but dynamite or the proper combination could ever move it the fraction of an inch." Stanley regarded it as it stood framed in its low Saxon portal, a magnificent piece of black oak, sprinkled from top to bottom with at least a hundred huge, silver-headed nails, driven in without any apparent design. Another peculiarity was that neither lock, hinges, nor keyhole were visible. "Does it lead anywhere?" he asked, greatly interested. "To an unexplored tower," she replied. "To which this appears to be the only entrance; at least it has no windows." "How interesting. I wonder how they ever got it open." "Tradition says that this is the original of our modern combination lock. No human strength can move it; but once exert the slightest pressure on the proper combination of those silver nails, five I believe, one for every digit, and the portal swings open of itself." "And discloses, what?" "Open it and see," she answered. "Are you sure the house won't tumble down if I do, or that you'll never smile again--or that some unpleasant ancestral prognostication isn't only awaiting the opening of that door to fall due and take effect?" "I can't insure you," she replied, "and I wish you wouldn't talk such nonsense," and she shivered slightly. "You surely don't believe, in the nineteenth century----" he began; but she interrupted him, saying almost petulantly: "You'd grow to believe anything if you lived in a place like this. On the whole, I think you'd better leave the door alone," she added, as he began to finger the nails thoughtfully, "you're too clever, you might succeed." "If I do," he assured her, "I'll promise to keep my discoveries to myself."