“You can call somebody. Now do, Steenie, there’s a darling cousin!—and I’ll ask Mother to make you some of those little pies you like so much. I will, really.”
“You outrageous wheedler! I suppose I shall have no peace till I get rid of you.—Henry!”
A lad of about twelve years old, who was crossing the court-yard at the other side, turned and came up at the call.
“Will you take this maid in, and get her speech of Cumina? She’s very good-natured, and if you tell her your story, Derette, I shouldn’t wonder if she helps you.”
“Oh, thank you, Steenie, so much!”
Derette followed Henry, who made faces at her, but gave her no further annoyance, into the servants’ offices at the Castle, where he turned her unceremoniously over to the first person he met—a cook in a white cap and apron—with the short and not too civil information that—
“She wants Cumina.”
The cook glanced carelessly at Derette.
“Go straight along the passage, and up the stairs to the left,” he said, and then went on about his own business.
Never before had Derette seen a house which contained above four rooms at the utmost. She felt in utter confusion amid stairs, doors, and corridors. But she managed to find the winding staircase at the end of the passage, and to mount it, wishing much that so convenient a mode of access could replace the ladder in her mother’s house. She went up till she could go no further, when she found herself on the top landing of a round tower, without a human creature to be seen. There were two doors, however; and after rapping vainly at both, she ventured to open one. It led to the leads of the tower. Derette closed this, and tried the other. She found it to open on a dark fathomless abyss,—the Castle well (Note 3), had she known it—and shut it quickly with a sensation of horror. After a moment’s reflection, she went down stairs to the next landing.