



Produced by Delphine Lettau and the Online Distributed
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  [Illustration: The children leant forward and peered down into this
  wonderful box. _Page 113._]




UNDER PADLOCK AND SEAL

BY HAROLD AVERY


Thomas Nelson and Sons
London, Edinburgh, Dublin
and New York




 _CONTENTS._

    _I. Downstairs in the Dark_,            9
   _II. The Lost Carving-Knife_,           19
  _III. Uncle Roger's Box_,                30
   _IV. The Box Opened_,                   41
    _V. A Naval Disaster_,                 51
   _VI. More Mystery_,                     61
  _VII. Sad News_,                         71
 _VIII. Elsie has a Fright_,               82
   _IX. A Fresh Discovery_,                93
    _X. Elsie's Confession_,              103
   _XI. Uncle Roger's Legacy_,            112
  _XII. The Riddle Solved_,               122




UNDER PADLOCK AND SEAL.

 [Illustration]




CHAPTER I.

DOWNSTAIRS IN THE DARK.


Elsie pushed away the bed-clothes which were covering her ear, and
listened; then she sat up in bed, and listened again.

 [Illustration]

There was no doubt that it was an actual sound, and not mere
imagination. How long it had been going on, or when it first began to
mingle in a confused manner with her dreams, she could not say; but now
she heard it plainly enough, and recognized what it was--the peculiar,
grating hiss of a grindstone, punctuated every now and then with a
subdued little squeak made by the treadle.

Who on earth should want to be grinding anything