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Page 22
"You are ardent in work as well as in love!" said the German,
laughing.
"Yes; I have been waiting here for nearly half an hour."
"I hope you left no clue as to where we were going."
"Not such a fool! By Jove, I am chilled to the bone! Come on,
Burger, let us warm ourselves by a spurt of hard walking."
Their footsteps sounded loud and crisp upon the rough stone
paving of the disappointing road which is all that is left of the
most famous highway of the world. A peasant or two going home from
the wine-shop, and a few carts of country produce coming up to
Rome, were the only things which they met. They swung along, with
the huge tombs looming up through the darkness upon each side of
them, until they had come as far as the Catacombs of St. Calistus,
and saw against a rising moon the great circular bastion of Cecilia
Metella in front of them. Then Burger stopped with his hand to his
side.
"Your legs are longer than mine, and you are more accustomed to
walking," said he, laughing. "I think that the place where we turn
off is somewhere here. Yes, this is it, round the corner of the
trattoria. Now, it is a very narrow path, so perhaps I had better
go in front and you can follow."
He had lit his lantern, and by its light they were enabled to
follow a narrow and devious track which wound across the marshes of
the Campagna. The great Aqueduct of old Rome lay like a monstrous
caterpillar across the moonlit landscape, and their road led
them under one of its huge arches, and past the circle of crumbling
bricks which marks the old arena. At last Burger stopped at a
solitary wooden cow-house, and he drew a key from his pocket.
"Surely your catacomb is not inside a house!" cried Kennedy
"The entrance to it is. That is just the safeguard which we
have against anyone else discovering it."
"Does the proprietor know of it?"
"Not he. He had found one or two objects which made me almost
certain that his house was built on the entrance to such a place.
So I rented it from him, and did my excavations for myself. Come
in, and shut the door behind you."
It was a long, empty building, with the mangers of the cows
along one wall. Burger put his lantern down on the ground, and
shaded its light in all directions save one by draping his overcoat
round it.
"It might excite remark if anyone saw a light in this lonely
place," said he. "Just help me to move this boarding."
The flooring was loose in the corner, and plank by plank the
two savants raised it and leaned it against the wall. Below there
was a square aperture and a stair of old stone steps which led away
down into the bowels of the earth.
"Be careful!" cried Burger, as Kennedy, in his impatience,
hurried down them. "It is a perfect rabbits'-warren below, and if
you were once to lose your way there the chances would be a hundred
to one against your ever coming out again. Wait until I bring the
light."
"How do you find your own way if it is so complicated?"
"I had some very narrow escapes at first, but I have gradually
learned to go about. There is a certain system to it, but it is
one which a lost man, if he were in the dark, could not possibly
find out. Even now I always spin out a ball of string behind me
when I am going far into the catacomb. You can see for yourself
that it is difficult, but every one of these passages divides and
subdivides a dozen times before you go a hundred yards."
They had descended some twenty feet from the level of the byre,
and they were standing now in a square chamber cut out of the soft
tufa. The lantern cast a flickering light, bright below and
dim above, over the cracked brown walls. In every direction
were the black openings of passages which radiated from this common
centre.
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