"All is well," he said as if to himself, and then he led the way down a flight of stairs which I had not hitherto noticed. Presently we came to a dark cellar, which I saw was hewn out of the rock. We were now among the foundations of the house, and my heart beat fast at the thought that I was near placing my hand upon the precious document, which my father declared would make my fortune. "Who could find us here, Master Roland?" he cackled again; "not one in fifty. But Old Solomon is wise, and he does not live at Pycroft Hall for nought." Whereupon he held the candle close to the floor, as if searching for something. "Do you see anything?" he asked. "Nothing," I replied. "Think you there is aught beneath here?" "Beneath here? No, we are already in the bowels of the earth." "Ah, that is good!" and again he cackled like a man well pleased with himself. Presently I saw him pressing the ground hard with his heel, and then, as if by magic, there opened close by my feet a dark aperture. "Descend," he cried, "descend!" "We will go together, Father Solomon," I made answer. "Ah, you do not trust me. A good youth, a cautious youth." Still holding the candle in one hand, he came close to the dark hole in the ground, from which came a musty ill-smelling air, and then he put his left foot into the hole, while I held his right arm. "That is well," he said, and then I saw the rungs of a ladder. One, two, three, four steps he went down, until I was almost dragged into the darkness in my endeavour to hold him fast. "Come, come, Master Roland; but mind, it needs a brave heart." I confess it here, I hesitated before following. How it may appear to those who read this I know not, but at that moment I seemed to be in a ghastly dream. Everything had become unreal to me save the shadow of a great terror. The old man, with his head sunk between his shoulders, was such a creature as only comes to one in a nightmare; the king's marriage contract existed only in the wild imaginings of foolish men. A thousand dangers suggested themselves, nameless dangers, and therefore all the more terrible, and try as I might I could not keep from trembling. "Afraid, Master Roland, eh? Ay, and well thou mayst be, for this hole is full of lost spirits. Hark! do you not hear them?" In the excited state of my imagination I fancied I heard distant wails, and I felt my blood run cold. "And yet only yesternight the fair Constance took this road, and she was not afraid." He said this tauntingly, which caused anger to take the place of fear. I still held his right arm, the hand of which grasped one of the staves of the ladder, and his words made my grasp the tighter. "I will come with you, Father Solomon," I said; "but mind, if you betray me, I will send you to hell with all your sins upon your head."