On the other side of the gallery there was a litter of old chains, and some boards, probably left over from the doors.  Yes! and there were two old flintlock guns, and several cutlasses, all eaten away with rust, also a rough seaman’s chest open and falling to pieces.  At the sight of that, a wild thought flashed through my brain.  What if—­Good God!—­What if this was John Teach’s treasury!—­behind those grim doors.  I threw myself with all my force against one and then the other.  For the moment I forgot that my paramount business was to escape.  But I might as well have hurled myself against the solid rock.  And, at that moment, I noticed that the place was darker than it had been.  My lantern was going out.  In a moment or two, I should be in the pitch dark, and I had discovered that the door at the end of the gallery was as solid as the others.

I was to be trapped, after all; and I pictured myself slowly dying there of hunger—­the pangs of which I was already beginning to feel—­and some one, years hence, finding me there, a mouldering skeleton—­some one who would break open those doors, uncover those gleaming hoards, and moralise on the irony of my end; condemned to die there of starvation, with the treasure I had so long sought on the other side of those unyielding doors.  Old Tom’s words suddenly flashed over me, and I could feel my hair literally beginning to rise.  “There never was a buried treasure yet that didn’t claim its victim.”  Great God!—­and I was to be the ghost, and keep guard in this terrible tomb till the next dead man came along to relieve me of my sentry duty!

Frantically I turned up the wick of my lantern at the thought—­but it was no use; it was plainly going out.  I examined my match-box; I had still a dozen or so matches left.  And then my eye fell on that shattered chest.  There were those boards, too.  At all events I could build a fire and make torches of slivers of wood, so long as the wood lasted.

And then I had an idea.  Why not make the fire against the door at the end of the gallery, and so burn my way through.  Bravo!  My spirits rose at the thought, and I set to at once—­splitting some small kindling with my knife.  In a few minutes I had quite a sprightly little fire going at the bottom of the door; but I saw that I should have to be extravagant with my wood if the fire was to be effective.  However, it was neck or nothing; so I piled on beams and boards till my fire roared like a furnace, and presently I had the joy of seeing it begin to take hold of the door—­which, after a short time, began to crackle and splutter in a very cheering fashion.

Whatever lay beyond, it was evident that I should soon be able to break my way through the obstacle, and, indeed, so it proved; for, presently, I used one of the boards as a battering ram, and, to my inexpressible joy, it went crashing through, with a shower of sparks, and it was but the work of a few more minutes before the whole door fell flaming down, and I was able to leap through the doorway into the darkness on the other side.