But the sense of self-preservation was on me, self-assertive enough, and I obliged him, stumbling in at the door under the pressure of his strong arm and of the revolver, and beginning to boggle at the first steps--old and much worn ones, which were deeply hollowed in the middle.

He shoved me forward.
"Up you go," he said, "straight ahead! Put your arms up and out--in front of you till you feel a door--push it open." He kept one hand on the scruff of my neck--too tightly for comfort--and with the other pressed the revolver into the cavity just above it, and in this fashion we went up.

And even in that predicament I must have had my wits about me, for I counted two-and-twenty steps.

Then came the door--a heavy, iron-studded piece of strong oak, and it was slightly open, and as I pushed it wider in the darkness, a musty, close smell came from whatever was within.
"No steps," said he, "straight on! Now then, halt--and keep halting! If you move one finger, Moneylaws, out fly your brains! No great loss to the community, my lad--but I've some use for them yet." He took his hand away from my neck, but the revolver was still pressed into my hair, and the pressure never relaxed.

And suddenly I heard a snap behind me, and the place in which we stood was lighted up--feebly, but enough to show me a cell-like sort of room, stone-walled, of course, and destitute of everything in the furnishing way but a bit of a cranky old table and a couple of three-legged stools on either side of it.