"
"Certainly, Uncle Horace," answered Leo; for I had brought him up to
call me uncle--though he varied the appellation somewhat disrespectfully
by calling me "old fellow," or even "my avuncular relative."
Job touched his head, not having a hat on.
"Lock the door, Job," I said, "and bring me my despatch-box."
He obeyed, and from the box I took the keys that poor Vincey, Leo's
father, had given me on the night of his death. There were three of
them; the largest a comparatively modern key, the second an exceedingly
ancient one, and the third entirely unlike anything of the sort that we
had ever seen before, being fashioned apparently from a strip of solid
silver, with a bar placed across to serve as a handle, and leaving
some nicks cut in the edge of the bar. It was more like a model of an
antediluvian railway key than anything else.
"Now are you both ready?" I said, as people do when they are going to
fire a mine. There was no answer, so I took the big key, rubbed some
salad oil into the wards, and after one or two bad shots, for my hands
were shaking, managed to fit it, and shoot the lock.
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