It was late when I got up. I lay in my bed, looking around the four
walls of the room, and trying to imagine behind what one of them a
secret chamber might lie. Certainly, in daylight, Sunnyside deserved
its name: never was a house more cheery and open, less sinister in
general appearance. There was not a corner apparently that was not
open and above-board, and yet, somewhere behind its handsomely papered
walls I believed firmly that there lay a hidden room, with all the
possibilities it would involve.
I made a mental note to have the house measured during the day, to
discover any discrepancy between the outer and inner walls, and I tried
to recall again the exact wording of the paper Jamieson had found.
The slip had said "chimney." It was the only clue, and a house as
large as Sunnyside was full of them. There was an open fireplace in my
dressing-room, but none in the bedroom, and as I lay there, looking
around, I thought of something that made me sit up suddenly. The
trunk-room, just over my head, had an open fireplace and a brick
chimney, and yet, there was nothing of the kind in my room. I got out
of bed and examined the opposite wall closely. There was apparently no
flue, and I knew there was none in the hall just beneath. The house
was heated by steam, as I have said before. In the living-room was a
huge open fireplace, but it was on the other side.
Why did the trunk-room have both a radiator and an open fireplace?
Architects were not usually erratic! It was not fifteen minutes before
I was up-stairs, armed with a tape-measure in lieu of a foot-rule,
eager to justify Mr. Jamieson's opinion of my intelligence, and firmly
resolved not to tell him of my suspicion until I had more than theory
to go on. The hole in the trunk-room wall still yawned there, between
the chimney and the outer wall. I examined it again, with no new
result. The space between the brick wall and the plaster and lath one,
however, had a new significance. The hole showed only one side of the
chimney, and I determined to investigate what lay in the space on the
other side of the mantel.
I worked feverishly. Liddy had gone to the village to market, it being
her firm belief that the store people sent short measure unless she
watched the scales, and that, since the failure of the Traders' Bank,
we must watch the corners; and I knew that what I wanted to do must be
done before she came back. I had no tools, but after rummaging around
I found a pair of garden scissors and a hatchet, and thus armed, I set
to work. The plaster came out easily: the lathing was more obstinate.
It gave under the blows, only to spring back into place again, and the
necessity for caution made it doubly hard.