The herald., 1898-11-06

secret ana mysterious paSSageWay
After we had walked perhaps seventy
feet, we came to n chamber about
twelve feet square, and here it seemed
to end. On our way along the corridor
my charming companion had found
and picked up a handkerchief and
after examining it minutely, she now
cried out:
by all the martyrs and Messer Sar
Nicolo into the bargain, this is naught
other than the handkerchief of Pico
Albizzi my beloved cousin and the
brother of FEDERICO. It is now the
half of a year past that he did come
to this, the Pazzi castle, to summon
thy sire Lodovico to the presence of
the duke my father. Days passed and
he returned not and it was a week
afterward that peasant. passing by
the Arno, by which name, as thou
knowest, is sometimes called the tur-
bulent stream which floweth through
the town. found upon the banks of it,
some way below the city, his lifeless
corse. Santissima Vergine! he hath.
like Ser Ridolfo, been thrown into the
Pazzi well, and this passage. this very
room, did conduct him to it,"
"But fair lady," said I. "If that is
so. how came he to be found upon the
Amos banks?"
And was not Ser Ridolfo's body
also found there?" she answered with
some dsdain. May there not well be.
from this black bottomless we'll Of thy
castle, a sluiceway leading to that
neighboring stream?"
l now examined the chamber into
which we had come, and found in the
middle of the floor, a great crack
which reached from wall to wall, and
I made up my mind that we were
standing directly over the watery
tomb which had proved so convenient
in the cases of Messers Ridolfo and
Pico. 1t seemed to me altogether like
ly that the floor of the room, having
the great crack in the middle of it,
was made in two halves, and that
these two halves could be let down
like lids, whenever any one should
touch the lever or spring which opened
them. Coming to this conclusion, l at
once led Ippolita out of that insidious
death trap, and we commenced to
search along the walls of the passage
way for the mechanism by which 1t
could be made to operate l soon found
an iron lever or handle in the corner
Immediately outside the room, and I
took hold of it, and pulled, and at once
the two halves of the floor went down,
as though they We're hinged to the
walls, and in the place of the floor, we
saw nothing but black, frightful, i'm
penetrable water
l now dragged the dead body of the
| cook to the we'll and threw it in. He
came to the surface and floated there
upon his back, and as his great fish
| like eyes were wide open, he presented
spectacle which was anything but
agreeable. This water now, all at once
seemed to sink and recede. Then there
came up a great sucking, gurgling
noise, and we looked down and saw
that it had all gone out of the bottom,
taking the cook with it. In a moment
the water commenced to come up
again. We could not see it at first,
way down between the black shining
rocks, mounting little by little. then 1t
seemed to rise faster and in five MIN
utes, it was UP to the level where we
had first seen it. l now worked the
lever the other way, and the two halves
of the floor came UP and met, and the
chamber was exactly as it was when
we had first entered it.
At this moment, we heard a LOUD
knocking at the great street door OF tne
palace. 1t instantly occurred to me
that it was made by Ippolitas people,
who had found her whereabouts and
come for her. and l Immediately set
about letting them in. 1t was some
time before / could find the key and,
meanwhile, they kept at it hammer
and tongs, so that l was glad at length
to be able to unlock the door and to
stop their internal din. But 10 and be-
hold! when I finally opened it, instead