At any rate she determined that if she did find the secret entrance to these little rooms, and found that they were empty she would not be disheartened, but would search further until she found either some secret closet where the will might be placed, or an entrance to some perhaps larger hiding-place below.

Her subsequent search outside showed her that there existed several small iron gratings about six inches long and three deep, close down to the soil of the border.

No doubt these were intended to give ventilation underneath the floors, which were some two feet above the outside level, but one of them might also afford ventilation to an underground chamber.
Three months passed, and on the occasion of each of her visits to the room she devoted some time to the examination of the carved woodwork round the fireplace and that of the bookcases, but without making any discovery whatever; and it became evident to her that a far closer search would be needed than the short and hasty examination that was all she dared to make, with the possibility that at any moment Miss Penfold might appear at the door.

Accordingly she wrote to Mr.
Tallboys, and told him that it would be necessary for her to obtain a cake of very soft wax, four inches long and two inches wide, and asked him to procure it for her, and to send it in a wooden box to her by the carrier's cart that once a week journeyed from Weymouth to the villages in the neighborhood of the Hall.
Ten days later she received the wax, and the next time the day for cleaning the library arrived she quietly withdrew the key from the door as soon as Miss Penfold had left her, laid it on the wax, and pressed it steadily until a deep impression was made upon its surface.
Then she carefully examined the key to see that no particle of wax had stuck between the wards, replaced it in the door, closed the lid of the little box in which the wax lay, and put it in her pocket, and then set to at her work of cleaning.
Upon this occasion she spent no time in trying to find the spring.
There was danger now as always of Miss Penfold's coming, and as she would soon have the means of entering the room at her will she would run no risk.

A few days later she asked for a day to go to Weymouth to purchase some things of which she had need, and when there she called upon Mr.Tallboys.
"How are you, Mrs.Conway ?" the lawyer said when the door had closed behind her.