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The Ancient Treasure House 古代藏宝室
“This wasn’t a garden,” said Susan presently. “It was a castle and this must have been the courtyard.”
“I see what you mean,” said Peter. “Yes. That is the remains of a tower. And there is what used to be a flight of steps going up to the top of the walls. And look at those other steps—the broad, shallow ones—going up to that doorway. It must have been the door into the great hall.”
“Ages ago, by the look of it,” said Edmund.
“Yes, ages ago,” said Peter. “I wish we could find out who the people were that lived in this castle; and how long ago.”
“It gives me a queer feeling,” said Lucy.
“Does it, Lu?” said Peter, turning and looking hard at her. “Because it does the same to me. It is the queerest thing that has happened this queer day. I wonder where we are and what it all means?”
While they were talking they had crossed the courtyard and gone through the other doorway into what had once been the hall. This was now very like the courtyard, for the roof had long since disappeared and it was merely another space of grass and daisies, except that it was shorter and narrower and the walls were higher. Across the far end there was a kind of terrace about three feet higher than the rest.
“I wonder, was it really the hall?” said Susan. “What is that terrace kind of thing?”
“Why, you silly,” said Peter (who had become strangely excited), “don’t you see? That was the dais where the High Table was, where the King and the great lords sat. Anyone would think you had forgotten that we ourselves were once Kings and Queens and sat on a dais just like that, in our great hall.”
“In our castle of Cair Paravel,” continued Susan in a dreamy and rather sing—song voice, “at the mouth of the great river of Narnia. How could I forget?”
“How it all comes back!” said Lucy. “We could pretend we were in Cair Paravel now. This hall must have been very like the great hall we feasted in.”
“But unfortunately without the feast,” said Edmund. “It’s getting late, you know. Look how long the shadows are. And have you noticed that it isn’t so hot?”
“We shall need a camp—fire if we’ve got to spend the night here,” said Peter. “I’ve got matches. Let’s go and see if we can collect some dry wood.”
Everyone saw the sense of this, and for the next half—hour they were busy. The orchard through which they had first come into the ruins turned out not to be a good place for firewood. They tried the other side of the castle, passing out of the hall by a little side door into a maze of stony humps and hollows which must once have been passages and smaller rooms but was now all nettles and wild roses. Beyond this they found a wide gap in the castle wall and stepped through it into a wood of darker and bigger trees where they found dead branches and rotten wood and sticks and dry leaves and fir—cones in plenty. They went to and fro with bundles until they had a good pile on the dais. At the fifth journey they found the well, just outside the hall, hidden in weeds, but clean and fresh and deep when they had cleared these away. The remains of a stone pavement ran halfway round it. Then the girls went out to pick some more apples and the boys built the fire, on the dais and fairly close to the corner between two walls, which they thought would be the snuggest and warmest place. They had great difficulty in lighting it and used a lot of matches, but they succeeded in the end. Finally, all four sat down with their backs to the wall and their faces to the fire. They tried roasting some of the apples on the ends of sticks. But roast apples are not much good without sugar, and they are too hot to eat with your fingers till they are too cold to be worth eating. So they had to content themselves with raw apples, which, as Edmund said, made one realize that school suppers weren’t so bad after all— “I shouldn’t mind a good thick slice of bread and margarine this minute,” he added. But the spirit of adventure was rising in them all, and no one really wanted to be back at school.
Shortly after the last apple had been eaten, Susan went out to the well to get another drink. When she came back she was carrying something in her hand.
“Look,” she said in a rather choking kind of voice. “I found it by the well.” She handed it to Peter and sat down. The others thought she looked and sounded as if she might be going to cry. Edmund and Lucy eagerly bent forward to see what was in Peter’s hand—a little, bright thing that gleamed in the firelight.
“Well, I’m—I’m jiggered,” said Peter, and his voice also sounded queer. Then he handed it to the others.
All now saw what it was—a little chess—knight, ordinary in size but extraordinarily heavy because it was made of pure gold; and the eyes in the horse’s head were two tiny little rubies or rather one was, for the other had been knocked out.
“Why!” said Lucy, “it’s exactly like one of the golden chessmen we used to play with when we were Kings and Queens at Cair Paravel.”
“Cheer up, Su,” said Peter to his other sister.
“I can’t help it,” said Susan. “It brought back—oh, such lovely times. And I remembered playing chess with fauns and good giants, and the mer—people singing in the sea, and my beautiful horse—and—and—”
“Now,” said Peter in a quite different voice, “it’s about time we four started using our brains.”
“What about?” asked Edmund.
“Have none of you guessed where we are?” said Peter.
“Go on, go on,” said Lucy. “I’ve felt for hours that there was some wonderful mystery hanging over this place.”
“Fire ahead, Peter,” said Edmund. “We’re all listening.”
“We are in the ruins of Cair Paravel itself,” said Peter.
“But, I say,” replied Edmund. “I mean, how do you make that out? This place has been ruined for ages. Look at all those big trees growing right up to the gates. Look at the very stones. Anyone can see that nobody has lived here for hundreds of years.”
“I know,” said Peter. “That is the difficulty. But let’s leave that out for the moment. I want to take the points one by one. First point: this hall is exactly the same shape and size as the hall at Cair Paravel. Just picture a roof on this, and a coloured pavement instead of grass, and tapestries on the walls, and you get our royal banqueting hall.”
No one said anything.
“Second point,” continued Peter. “The castle well is exactly where our well was, a little to the south of the great hall; and it is exactly the same size and shape.”
Again there was no reply.
“Third point: Susan has just found one of our old chessmen — or something as like one of them as two peas.”
Still nobody answered.
“Fourth point. Don’t you remember—it was the very day before the ambassadors came from the King of Calormen—don’t you remember planting the orchard outside the north gate of Cair Paravel? The greatest of all the wood—people, Pomona herself, came to put good spells on it. It was those very decent little chaps the moles who did the actual digging. Can you have forgotten that funny old Lilygloves, the chief mole, leaning on his spade and saying, ‘Believe me, your Majesty, you’ll be glad of these fruit trees one day.’ And by Jove he was right.”
“I do! I do!” said Lucy, and clapped her hands.
“But look here, Peter,” said Edmund. “This must be all rot. To begin with, we didn’t plant the orchard slap up against the gate. We wouldn’t have been such fools.”
“No, of course not,” said Peter. “But it has grown up to the gate since.”
“And for another thing,” said Edmund, “Cair Paravel wasn’t on an island.”
“Yes, I’ve been wondering about that. But it was a what—do—you—call—it, a peninsula. Jolly nearly an island. Couldn’t it have been made an island since our time? Somebody has dug a channel.”
“But half a moment!” said Edmund. “You keep on saying since our time. But it’s only a year ago since we came back from Narnia. And you want to make out that in one year castles have fallen down, and great forests have grown up, and little trees we saw planted ourselves have turned into a big old orchard, and goodness knows what else. It’s all impossible.”
“There’s one thing,” said Lucy. “If this is Cair Paravel there ought to be a door at this end of the dais. In fact we ought to be sitting with our backs against it at this moment. You know—the door that led down to the treasure chamber.”
“I suppose there isn’t a door,” said Peter, getting up.
The wall behind them was a mass of ivy.
“We can soon find out,” said Edmund, taking up one of the sticks that they had laid ready for putting on the fire. He began beating the ivied wall. Tap—tap went the stick against the stone, and again, tap—tap; and then, all at once, boomboom, with a quite different sound, a hollow, wooden sound.
“Great Scott!” said Edmund.
“We must clear this ivy away,” said Peter.
“Oh, do let’s leave it alone,” said Susan. “We can try it in the morning. If we’ve got to spend the night here I don’t want an open door at my back and a great big black hole that anything might come out of, besides the draught and the damp. And it’ll soon be dark.”
“Susan! How can you?” said Lucy with a reproachful glance. But both the boys were too much excited to take any notice of Susan’s advice. They worked at the ivy with their hands and with Peter’s pocket—knife till the knife broke. After that they used Edmund’s. Soon the whole place where they had been sitting was covered with ivy; and at last they had the door cleared.
“Locked, of course,” said Peter.
“But the wood’s all rotten,” said Edmund. “We can pull it to bits in no time, and it will make extra firewood. Come on.”
It took them longer than they expected and, before they had done, the great hall had grown dusky and the first star or two had come out overhead. Susan was not the only one who felt a slight shudder as the boys stood above the pile of splintered wood, rubbing the dirt off their hands and staring into the cold, dark opening they had made.
“Now for a torch,” said Peter.
“Oh, what is the good?” said Susan. “And as Edmund said—”
“I’m not saying it now,” Edmund interrupted. “I still don’t understand, but we can settle that later. I suppose you’re coming down, Peter?”
“We must,” said Peter. “Cheer up, Susan. It’s no good behaving like kids now that we are back in Narnia.
You’re a Queen here. And anyway no one could go to sleep with a mystery like this on their minds.”
They tried to use long sticks as torches but this was not a success. If you held them with the lighted end up they went out, and if you held them the other way they scorched your hand and the smoke got in your eyes. In the end they had to use Edmund’s electric torch; luckily it had been a birthday present less than a week ago and the battery was almost new. He went first, with the light. Then came Lucy, then Susan, and Peter brought up the rear.
“I’ve come to the top of the steps,” said Edmund.
“Count them,” said Peter.
“One—two—three,” said Edmund, as he went cautiously down, and so up to sixteen. “And this is the bottom,” he shouted back.
“Then it really must be Cair Paravel,” said Lucy. “There were sixteen.” Nothing more was said till all four were standing in a knot together at the foot of the stairway. Then Edmund flashed his torch slowly round.
“O—o—o—oh!!” said all the children at once.
For now all knew that it was indeed the ancient treasure chamber of Cair Paravel where they had once reigned as Kings and Queens of Narnia. There was a kind of path up the middle (as it might be in a greenhouse), and along each side at intervals stood rich suits of armour, like knights guarding the treasures. In between the suits of armour, and on each side of the path, were shelves covered with precious things—necklaces and arm rings and finger rings and golden bowls and dishes and long tusks of ivory, brooches and coronets and chains of gold, and heaps of unset stones lying piled anyhow as if they were marbles or potatoes—diamonds, rubies, carbuncles, emeralds, topazes, and amethysts. Under the shelves stood great chests of oak strengthened with iron bars and heavily padlocked. And it was bitterly cold, and so still that they could hear themselves breathing, and the treasures were so covered with dust that unless they had realized where they were and remembered most of the things, they would hardly have known they were treasures. There was something sad and a little frightening about the place, because it all seemed so forsaken and long ago. That was why nobody said anything for at least a minute.
Then, of course, they began walking about and picking things up to look at. It was like meeting very old friends. If you had been there you would have heard them saying things like, “Oh look! Our coronation rings—do you remember first wearing this? —Why, this is the little brooch we all thought was lost—I say, isn’t that the armour you wore in the great tournament in the Lone Islands? —do you remember the dwarf making that for me? —do you remember drinking out of that horn? —do you remember, do you remember?”
But suddenly Edmund said, “Look here. We mustn’t waste the battery: goodness knows how often we shall need it. Hadn’t we better take what we want and get out again?”
“We must take the gifts,” said Peter. For long ago at a Christmas in Narnia he and Susan and Lucy had been given certain presents which they valued more than their whole kingdom. Edmund had had no gift, because he was not with them at the time. (This was his own fault, and you can read about it in the other book.)
They all agreed with Peter and walked up the path to the wall at the far end of the treasure chamber, and there, sure enough, the gifts were still hanging. Lucy’s was the smallest for it was only a little bottle. But the bottle was made of diamond instead of glass, and it was still more than half full of the magical cordial which would heal almost every wound and every illness. Lucy said nothing and looked very solemn as she took her gift down from its place and slung the belt over her shoulder and once more felt the bottle at her side where it used to hang in the old days. Susan’s gift had been a bow and arrows and a horn. The bow was still there, and the ivory quiver, full of wellfeathered arrows, but— “Oh, Susan,” said Lucy “Where’s the horn?”
“Oh bother, bother, bother,” said Susan after she had thought for a moment “I remember now. I took it with me the last day of all, the day we went hunting the White Stag. It must have got lost when we blundered back into that other place—England, I mean.”
Edmund whistled. It was indeed a shattering loss; for this was an enchanted horn and, whenever you blew it, help was certain to come to you, wherever you were.
“Just the sort of thing that might come in handy in a place like this,” said Edmund.
“Never mind,” said Susan, “I’ve still got the bow.” And she took it.
“Won’t the string be perished, Su?” said Peter.
But whether by some magic in the air of the treasure chamber or not, the bow was still in working order. Archery and swimming were the things Susan was good at. In a moment she had bent the bow and then she gave one little pluck to the string. It twanged: a chirruping twang that vibrated through the whole room. And that one small noise brought back the old days to the children’s minds more than anything that had happened yet. All the battles and hunts and feasts came rushing into their heads together.
Then she unstrung the bow again and slung the quiver at her side.
Next, Peter took down his gift—the shield with the great red lion on it, and the royal sword. He blew, and rapped them on the floor, to get off the dust. He fitted the shield on his arm and slung the sword by his side. He was afraid at first that it might be rusty and stick to the sheath. But it was not so. With one swift motion he drew it and held it up, shining in the torchlight.
“It is my sword Rhindon,” he said; “with it I killed the Wolf.” There was a new tone in his voice, and the others all felt that he was really Peter the High King again. Then, after a little pause, everyone remembered that they must save the battery.
They climbed the stair again and made up a good fire and lay down close together for warmth. The ground was very hard and uncomfortable, but they fell asleep in the end.
“这不是一个花园，”很快，苏珊开口说道，“过去一定是座城堡，这儿想必就是城堡的院子。”
“我明白你的意思，”彼得说，“没错。那是一座塔楼的残余。那些是通到墙头上去的台阶。再看看其他那些台阶——那些不太陡的宽台阶——一直通到那个门道。那肯定是通向大厅的门。”
“从它衰败的样子来看，这是许多世纪以前的事儿了。”埃德蒙说。
“是的，很久以前，”彼得说，“希望我们能够发现，是谁曾经在这座古堡里住过，那是什么时候的事情。”
“我有一种奇怪的感觉。”露西说。
“是吗，露？”彼得说着，转过身来，定睛看着她，“我也有同样的感觉。这是这个奇怪的一天所发生的最奇怪的事情。我很想知道，我们是在哪儿？这一切又都意味着什么？”
他们一边交谈，一边穿过庭院，经过另一个门道，进入了以前的大厅。这里和庭院已经没有多少差别，屋顶早就不见了，到处长满了青草和雏菊。与庭院相比，不同之处在于其面积比较狭小，墙壁显得略高一些。在大厅的另一端有个平台之类的东西，比地面高出来大约有一米。
“我怀疑，这里以前真的是个大厅吗？”苏珊说，“那个台子是做什么用的？”
“哦，你可真笨，”彼得说（他莫名其妙地兴奋起来），“难道你没看出来？那是放置御案的平台，国王与大臣就在那上面就座。人们会以为，你已经忘记了我们自己曾经是国王与女王，曾经高坐在宫廷中类似的平台上。”
“就在我们的凯尔帕拉维尔城堡，”苏珊用一种梦呓般的、如歌如述的声音继续说道，“在纳尼亚大河的河口。我怎么会忘记呢？”
“但愿那一幕又会重新上演！”露西说，“我们可以装作是在凯尔帕拉维尔，这个大厅一定与我们宴乐的宫廷非常相似。”
“不幸的是没有宴席，”埃德蒙说，“你们要知道，天色已晚。看看影子变得有多长了。你们没有注意到吗，温度已经没有那么高了。”
“如果在这里过夜的话，我们需要一个篝火，”彼得说，“我带着火柴。我们出去看看，能不能捡到一些干柴。”
大家都觉得这话很有道理。在随后的半个小时，他们都忙活起来。在废墟前的果园里没有多少干树枝，他们就到城堡的另一边去寻找。由一个小偏门走出大厅，外面是迷宫般的石堆与空地，想必这些曾经是走廊与众多的小房间，现在却到处长满了荨麻与野玫瑰。再往前，他们在城堡的墙上发现了一个很宽的缺口。走出缺口，他们来到了一个长着高大深色树木的树林。在这里，他们拣到了一些枯枝、朽木、干树叶，以及大量的冷杉球果。他们将这些东西扎成捆，一趟趟搬运回去，最后，在那个平台上堆了一大堆柴火。搬运到第五趟时，他们在大厅外发现了一口被野草遮盖住的水井。将野草剔除之后，他们发现井很深，里面的井水清澈洁净。有一条残破的石头甬道呈半圆形环绕着这口井。两个女孩子去采了一些苹果，两个男孩子负责生火。他们选了平台上两堵墙之间的一个角落，认为这个地方最舒适暖和。他们费了好大的劲儿，划了许多根火柴，终于把火点着了。一切就绪之后，兄妹四人背对着墙，围着篝火坐下。他们试着把苹果穿在树枝上用火烤，但是没有糖，烤苹果的味道不怎么样。苹果刚烤好时太烫，无法用手去拿，等到凉下来，又不好吃了。他们只好将就着吃些生苹果。正如埃德蒙所说的，吃生苹果使人意识到，学校的晚餐还不太糟糕——“这会儿如果有一大块奶油面包就好了。”他补充道。但是他们的内心都充满了一种冒险精神，并没有人真的想回到学校里去。
吃完最后一个苹果之后，苏珊又去井边汲水。她回来时，手上拿着一件东西。
“看，”她用一种哽咽的声音说，“我在井边找到的。”她把那个东西交给彼得，自己坐了下来。看她的样子，听她的声音，使人觉得她险些就要哭出声来。埃德蒙和露西急切地探过身子，想看看彼得手中到底拿了个什么——那是一个亮闪闪的小东西，在火光照耀下熠熠生辉。
“哦，我——我真晕，”彼得说，他的声音听上去也怪怪的，随手将那个东西递给他们。
现在他们看清楚了——那是国际象棋中的一颗马的棋子，与普通棋子的大小相仿，但因为是纯金打造的，搁在手上沉甸甸的。马的眼睛是两块小小的红宝石——或者不如说是一块，因为另一块已经丢失了。
“哎呀！”露西说，“这真像我们在凯尔帕拉维尔做王与女王时所用过的金棋子。”
“振作起来，苏。”彼得给大妹妹鼓劲道。
“我控制不住自己，”苏珊说，“它使我想起了——啊，多么美好的时光。我记得曾经和潘恩还有那些友好的巨人们下棋，水中仙子们在海中歌唱，我那匹漂亮的马儿——还有——还有——”
“现在，”彼得用一种激动的语调说道，“我们四个该动脑筋好好地思考一番了。”
“思考什么？”埃德蒙问道。
“你们没有猜到我们是在什么地方吗？”彼得说。
“快说，说下去，”露西催促道，“有好几个钟头了，我一直感到这个地方笼罩着某种奇妙的神秘。”
“继续说，彼得，”埃德蒙说，“我们都在洗耳恭听。”
“我们就在凯尔帕拉维尔的废墟之中。”彼得说。
“可是，我要说，”埃德蒙回答道，“我的意思是，你是怎么看出来的？这个地方已经荒废了许多个世纪。看看那些长到门口的大树。看看这些石头。任何人都能看得出来，这里已经有几百年无人居住了。”
“我知道，”彼得说，“那正是费解的地方。让我们暂时把那个放在一边。我想逐个谈一下我的理由。第一，这个大厅与凯尔帕拉维尔宫庭的形状和大小完全相同。只要想象这上面有个屋顶，将荒草换成五颜六色的小路，墙壁上装饰着挂毯，你就置身于我们的皇家御宴大厅了。”
没有一个人做声。
“第二点，”彼得接着讲道，“这个城堡的水井与我们的水井位置完全重合，也是在大厅外偏南的地方，而且大小形状都一模一样。”
照样，谁都没有吭声。
“第三点，苏珊刚发现了一颗我们用过的棋子——或者说跟我们的棋子完全相同的东西。”
众人还是不做声。
“第四点，你们记得吗——就在卡罗门王的使节到来的前一天——难道你们忘记了在凯尔帕拉维尔北门外开辟的果园？树精中最伟大的果树女神波莫娜亲自到场，为其祝福。那些非常可敬的小家伙，鼹鼠们，挖掘了一个个树坑。难道你们忘记了滑稽的老理理格拉乌，鼹鼠的头领，拄着铁锹说：‘陛下，请相信我，有一天你们会为这些果树感到高兴。’天哪，它说的话应验了。”
“我记得！我记得！”露西拍着双手嚷道。
“可是听我说，彼得，”埃德蒙说，“你的话都是一些胡言乱语。首先，我们并没有将果树一直栽到大门口。我们不会蠢到这个地步。”
“是的，当然不会，”彼得说，“是果树慢慢长到了门口。”
“另外，”埃德蒙说，“凯尔帕拉维尔并不在一个小岛上。”
“没错，我也一直在思考这件事。但那要看你如何称呼它，也许是半岛，差不多是个岛屿。没准儿在我们的时代之后，有人开凿了一个海峡，把它变为了一个海岛。”
“等一下！”埃德蒙说，“你不断提到我们的时代。可是我们离开纳尼亚才刚刚一年，在一年之内，城堡坍塌，大森林长成，我们亲眼看着栽种的小树变成了古老的大果园，天知道还有别的什么。这一切都是不可能的。”
“还有一件事，”露西说，“如果这是凯尔帕拉维尔，平台后边应该还有一扇门。事实上，此刻我们坐在这里，应该是背靠在那扇门上。你们知道——那扇门是通往藏宝室的。”
“我想这里并没有一扇门。”彼得说着，站起身来。
他们身后的那堵墙上长满了藤蔓。
“我们马上就可以一探究竟，”埃德蒙说着，拿起一根准备烧火用的木棍，开始敲打爬满青藤的墙壁。棍子打在石头上，发出啪啪的声响。他接着往前敲击，还是啪啪的声音。埃德蒙继续四下里敲击，忽然传来了咚咚声，与先前的声音大相径庭，那是一种空洞的、木头的低沉声响。
“天哪！”埃德蒙惊叫道。
“我们必须把这些藤蔓清除掉。”彼得说。
“啊，先留着它们，”苏珊说，“我们明早再试也不迟。如果我们在这里过夜，我可不想在背后有一扇敞开着的门，一个大黑洞，除了穿堂风和潮气，说不定还有什么东西会从里面钻出来。再说天很快就要黑了。”
“苏珊！你怎么能这样说话？”露西说着，用责备的目光瞥了她一眼。两个男孩子无比兴奋，根本就没有理睬苏珊的建议。他们用手拔藤蔓，又用彼得的小刀来割，不一会儿小刀就被弄断了。于是，他们又用埃德蒙的小刀。很快，刚才坐的那个地方就堆满了青藤。最后，他们总算把门给清理干净了。
“门自然是锁着的，”彼得说。
“木头早就糟了，”埃德蒙说，“我们一下子就能把它砸碎，还可以多一些柴火。来吧。”
他们花的时间比预想的要长，直到暮色苍茫，一两颗星星已在夜空中闪现，他们才把那扇门给弄开。一堆乱糟糟的木块散落在男孩子们的脚下，他们擦掉手上的泥巴，望着阴冷黑暗的门洞，不光是苏珊一个人打了个冷战。
“眼下需要一个火把。”彼得说。
“啊，有什么用处？”苏珊说，“正如埃德蒙所说——”
“我这会儿不再说了，”埃德蒙打断了她，“我还是搞不懂，不过我们很快就会弄明白。彼得，我猜你是打算下去，对吧？”
“我们必须下去，”彼得说，“苏珊，打起精神来。我们既然回到了纳尼亚，表现得象个孩子无济于事。你在这儿是个女王。不管怎么说，心里怀着一个未知的秘密，没有人能够睡得着觉。”
他们想用长木棍来做火把，但并没有成功。你若将点着的那一头朝上，火就会熄灭。如果将点着的那头朝下，火又会烧痛你的手，烟会熏着你的眼睛。到末了，他们只好使用埃德蒙的手电筒。幸好那是他几天前收到的生日礼物，电池差不多还是新的。他拿着手电筒，走在前边。露西跟在他的身后，接下去是苏珊，彼得担任后卫。
“我已到了台阶的顶端。”埃德蒙说。
“数一下，”彼得说。
“一——二——三，”埃德蒙嘴里数着，一边小心翼翼地下台阶，他一直数到第十六级。“到底了。”他朝上面喊道。
“看来这里真的是凯尔帕拉维尔，”露西说，“原来的台阶就是十六级。”谁都没有搭腔。最后大家全都走下台阶，挤成一团站在那里。埃德蒙用手电筒缓缓地照着四周。
“哦——哦——哦——哦！”四个孩子一连声地叫道。
这时，他们全都看出来了，这里的确是凯尔帕拉维尔的藏宝室。作为纳尼亚的国王与女王，他们曾经在这个地方执掌王权。藏宝室中间有一个过道（就像暖房那样），两边每隔一段距离就立着一副华丽的铠甲，很像守卫财宝的骑士。在过道两边的铠甲之间，是一些摆放着珍宝的架子——项链、臂环、指环、金碗碟、长长的象牙、胸针、冠状头饰和金链子，一堆堆还未镶嵌的宝石摊在架子上，仿佛是些弹子或是土豆——有钻石、红宝石、红玉、绿宝石、黄宝石和紫晶。架子下面放着大橡木箱子，有铁条加固，严严实实地锁着。藏宝室里十分阴冷，宁静得他们都能够听到自己的呼吸声。珠宝上蒙着厚厚的灰尘，要不是认出了自己所在的地方，并回忆起了大部分珍宝，他们将很难辨别出那都是些什么东西。这地方充斥着一种凄凉而恐怖的氛围，整个儿显露出一种衰败和陈旧的景象。因此至少有一分钟，没有一个人讲话。
当然，随即他们开始走动起来，拿起一些东西来观看。这就像是与老友重逢。如果你也在场，就会听到他们在说着这样一些话，“啊，看！这是我们加冕时的环——你还记得我们第一次戴上的情景吗？——哎呀，这是我们以为丢了的小胸针——喂，那不是你在孤独岛马上比武时穿的铠甲吗？——你们还记得小矮人为我制作那件首饰吗？——你们记不记得我们曾经用那个角来喝酒？——你们记得吗，你们记得吗？”
突然，埃德蒙说：“注意。我们不能浪费电池。天知道我们还有多么次要用到它。我们是否最好拿上一些需要的东西，就出去呢？”
“我们必须带上那些礼物。”彼得说。很久以前，在纳尼亚的一个圣诞节，他、苏珊还有露西都得到了一些礼物。他们将这些礼物看得比整个王国还要宝贵。埃德蒙没有得到礼物，因为当时他没有跟他们在一起。（这是他自己的过错，你在另一本书中可以读到前因后果。）
大家都赞同彼得的话，于是他们顺着过道，走到藏宝室最里面那一堵墙的跟前。果然，礼物还挂在墙上。露西的礼物最小，是一个小瓶子。但那瓶子不是用玻璃而是用钻石制成的，里面还有大半瓶神奇的药水。这药水几乎可以医治所有的创伤与疾病。露西默默地、神情庄重地取下自己的礼物，斜挎在肩上。她再一次感觉到，自己好像又回到了以往的岁月。苏珊的礼物是一张弓、一些箭和一只号角。弓还在原处，象牙箭筒里的翎毛箭还是满满的。但是——“哦，苏珊，”露西问，“号角在哪儿？”
“啊，糟了，糟了，糟了，”苏珊想了一下，连声叫道，“我想起来了。最后一天，就是我们去捕猎白鹿的那一天，我还带在身边。一定是我们匆匆返回另一个地方时给弄丢了——我指的是返回英国。”
埃德蒙吹了声口哨。确实这是个重大的损失。因为那个号角非常神奇，无论是什么时候，无论在什么地方，只要你吹响号角，就能够得到帮助。
“在这种地方，那个东西早晚都会派上用场的。”埃德蒙说。
“没关系，”苏珊说，“我还有弓。”她把弓取了下来。
“弓弦有没有朽坏，苏？”彼得问道。
不知是藏宝室的空气富有魔力还是怎么回事，弓依然保持着良好的状态。苏珊擅长射箭和游泳。她用力将弓拉满，轻轻弹了弹弓弦。弓弦嗵的响了一声，嗡嗡的声响使整个藏宝室的空气都震颤了起来。比起迄今所发生的一切，这个轻微的弓弦声更使得孩子们在脑海中浮想联翩，战斗、打猎、聚餐等场景纷至沓来。
然后，苏珊松开弓弦，把箭筒佩带在身上。
彼得也取下自己的礼物——画有红色巨狮的盾牌，和那把上乘宝剑。他吹了吹灰尘，又放在地板上轻轻拍打了一下，这才佩戴上宝剑，一只手拿着盾牌。起初，他还担心宝剑已生锈，害怕拔不出来。但出乎意外，他一下子就把宝剑拔出鞘来，高高举起，剑锋在手电筒的照射下发出一道寒光。
“这是我的宝剑雷顿，”他说，“我曾用它杀死了狼怪。”他的声音平添了新的力量，其他三个人感到，他再次变成了真正的彼得大帝。又过了一小会儿，他们才想起必须要节约电池。
他们顺着台阶来到平台上，挑旺了火，躺下依偎在一起互相取暖。地面很硬，硌得人很不舒服，但最终他们还是进入了梦乡。