In his interest in this explanation, Louis had not appeared to notice the evident excitement of Monsieur and old John Meadows and Miss Yvonne. Now he was thunderstruck when Monsieur asked him if it was possible to pull down the boarding around the fireplace. "Why, of course," exclaimed Louis, much astonished. "I have some tools I could use, and it wouldn't take much strength, but what's the use of demolishing it now? It will make an awful mess, and there probably isn't much beyond what we've already seen, anyhow. It would be a good thing, perhaps, to have this fine old room restored while we're away, but I don't see any use in beginning it now." The marquis, trembling so that he was forced to support himself by leaning on a packing-case, spoke with more decision than his hearers had ever heard before: "Tear down the woodwork, Louis. It is my wish. There may be an excellent reason." Without further protest, Louis went to work. The noontide sun grew hotter and hotter, but the company in that curiously littered room did not notice it. Not a word was spoken as they watched Louis, but a breathless suspense gripped them all,--all, that is, except Louis. To him it was only a useless whim of Monsieur's that he was obeying, and he was secretly rather irritated. He found, during the course of his labor, that the chimney-place ran clear behind the walls into the next room, which was that of old Mr. Meadows, but even this did not daunt the marquis. "Tear down the wall between, if you can. Knock it down, break it down, somehow. I do not care, so long as we free the chimney!" Before Louis was finished, the place looked as if it had suddenly been subjected to an air-raid and earthquake combined, but no one cared. By that time even Louis had begun to feel a vague suspicion that they were on the track of something. When the fireplace at last stood free amid the surrounding débris, he stepped aside, remarking: "There! That's about all I can do, I think. That was a clever piece of work--the way this other room has been entirely concealed. Not one of us has ever suspected that it was here, though I suppose if we'd been any sort of architects, we might have done so." "Oh, here are the old Dutch ovens!" cried the Imp, rushing forward to examine the curious little iron doorways in the sides of the chimney-place. "I saw the same thing in the Caswell house. They used to bake bread in those, when the chimney became good and hot." She pulled open one of them and thrust in her hand. "Gracious! There's something in here!" she almost shouted, hauling out a small iron box covered with the rust and dust and cobwebs of what must have been a century in hiding. "Give it to me! Give it to me!" cried old John Meadows, striding forward and fairly snatching it from her grasp. "It is the one, the very one my grandfather spoke of, and in the _chimney_, just as I have always thought he said."