“Won't you have another egg?” he asked, looking politely at her plate. Then he inquired if Miss Garrison would like to join him in a climb among the rocks. She smiled wistfully and said she would be charmed to do so if she were not too feeble with age when the time came to start.
Consumed with a desire to acquaint herself with her surroundings, she begged her companions to take her over the castle from turret to cellar. Later in the day, with Turk carrying the lantern, she was eagerly taking notes in the vast, spooky caves of Craneycrow.
Vaulted chambers here, narrow passages there, spider-ridden ceilings that awoke to life as the stooping visitors rustled beneath them, slimy walls and ringing floors, all went to make up the vast grave in which she was to bury all hope of escape. Immense were the iron-bound doors that led from one room to another; huge the bolts and rusty the hinges; gruesome and icy the atmosphere; narrow the steps that led to regions deeper in the bowels of the earth. Dorothy's heart sank like lead as she surveyed the impregnable walls and listened to the mighty groans of long-sleeping doors as the shoulder of the sturdy Turk awoke them to torpid activity. There was surprise and resentment in the creak of grim old hinges, in the moans of rheumatic timbers, in the jangle of lazy chains and locks. The stones on which they trod seemed to snap back in the echo of their footfalls a harsh, strident laugh of derision. Every shadow grinned mockingly at her; the very darkness ahead of the lantern's way seemed to snort angrily at the approach of the intruders. The whole of that rockbound dungeon roared defiance in answer to her timid prayer, and snarled an ugly challenge to her courage.
Lady Saxondale and Dickey confronted two rather pale-faced girls when the party of explorers again stood in the sunlit halls above. Across their shrinking faces cobwebs were lashed, plastered with the dank moisture of ages; in their eyes gleamed relief and from their lips came long breaths of thankfulness. Turk, out of sight and hearing, was roundly cursing the luck that had given him such a disagreeable task as the one just ended. From the broad, warm windows in the south drawing-room, once the great banquet hall, the quartet of uncomfortable sight-seekers looked out upon the open courtyard that stretched down to the fort-like wall, and for the moment Dorothy envied Philip Quentin. He was briskly pacing the stone-paved inclosure, smoking his pipe and basking in the sunshine that had never penetrated to the horrors of Castle Craneycrow. Lord Bob was serenely lounging on a broad oaken bench, his back to the sun, reading from some musty-backed book.
“Oh, won't you let me go out in the sun for just a little while?” she cried, imploringly. A mist came over Lady Saxondale's eyes and Dickey turned away abruptly.
“As often as you like, Dorothy. The courtyard is yours as much as it is ours. Jane, will you take her through our fort? Show her the walls, the parapets, the bastions, and where the moat and drawbridge were when the place was young. It is very interesting, Dorothy.”
With Dickey and Lady Jane, Dorothy passed into the courtyard and into the open air for the first time in nearly a week. She felt like a bird with clipped wings. The most casual inspection convinced her that there was no possible chance of escape from the walled quadrangle, in the center of which loomed the immense, weather-painted castle. The wall was high and its strength was as unbroken as in its earliest days. Lord Saxondale joined them and explained to her all the points of interest about the castle as viewed from the outside, but Quentin quietly abandoned his walk and disappeared.
“It is as difficult to get out of Castle Craney-crow as it is to get in, I dare say,” observed Dorothy, looking with awe upon the grim old pile of rocks, they called a castle. Far above their heads stood the tower, from which she had seen earth and sky as if in a panorama, three days before.
“One might be able to get out if he could fly. It seems the only way, provided, of course, there were opposition to his departure,” said Lord Bob, smiling.
“Alas, I cannot fly,” she said, directly.