"Damnation! I'm not going to be trapped," roared Rofflash, "I know the
secret way to the chapel. You stay here and face 'em."
"No. If that murderous mob doesn't find you they'll turn upon me. I'm an
old man but they'll have no mercy," whined Mountchance.
"You fool. Can't you see that some one _inside_ the house must have
bolted and barred the door? If they don't find you they'll search until
they do. You must tell them that I'm not in the place--that you haven't
seen me. That'll satisfy 'em and they'll go away quickly."
"It's you that's the fool. Somebody must have seen you enter--how else
did they know you were here?"
Another ominous splintering noise, then the sharp crack of ripping wood.
"No more of this damned nonsense," muttered Rofflash, and swinging his
arm he gave Mountchance a blow with the flat of his hand, toppling him
over. Without waiting to see what injury he had inflicted Rofflash
rushed to a tall cabinet, entered it and closed the doors after him just
as a yell of savage joy was raised outside. The iron bar was still
across the entrance but there was a jagged aperture above and below. A
couple of seconds more and the cabinet was empty. Rofflash had
disappeared through a secret door at the back.
Mountchance's house, as already mentioned, was really an adjunct of St.
Thomas's chapel, so far at least as the foundation was concerned. This
foundation had once formed the lower chapel or crypt and was then the
only distinctive relic of the bridge built by Peter of Colechurch, in
the thirteenth century.
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