Those
old quarries had a certain picturesqueness. They had become grass-grown;
ivy, shrubs, trees had clustered about them--the people who lived in the
few houses half a mile away, sometimes walked around them; the children
made a playground of the place: Pratt himself had often gone into some
quiet corner to read and smoke. And now his quick mind immediately
suggested a safe hiding place for this thing that he could not carry
away with him, and dare not leave to the morning sun--close by was a
pit, formerly used for some quarrying purpose, which was filled, always
filled, with water. It was evidently of considerable depth; the water
was black in it; the mouth was partly obscured by a maze of shrub and
bramble. It had been like that ever since Pratt came to lodge in that
part of the district--ten or twelve years before; it would probably
remain like that for many a long year to come. That bit of land was
absolutely useless and therefore neglected, and as long as rain fell and
water drained, that pit would always be filled to its brim.
He remembered something else: also close by where he stood--a heap of
old iron things--broken and disused picks, smashed rails, fragments
thrown aside when the last of the limestone had been torn out of the
quarries. Once more luck was playing into his hands--those odds and ends
might have been put there for the very purpose to which he now meant to
turn them.
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