“I am afraid you feel ill, Miss Oldcastle.”
“Not at all,” she answered, more quickly than she had yet spoken.
“This place must be damp,” I said. “I fear you have taken cold.”
She drew herself up a little haughtily, thinking, no doubt, that after her denial I was improperly pressing the point. So I drew back to the subject of our conversation.
“But I can hardly think,” I said, “that all this mass of stone could be required to build the house, large as it is. A house is not solid, you know.”
“No,” she answered. “The original building was more of a castle, with walls and battlements. I can show you the foundations of them still; and the picture, too, of what the place used to be. We are not what we were then. Many a cottage, too, has been built out of this old quarry. Not a stone has been taken from it for the last fifty years, though. Just let me show you one thing, Mr. Walton, and then I must leave you.”
“Do not let me detain you a moment. I will go at once,” I said; “though, if you would allow me, I should be more at ease if I might see you safe at the top of the stair first.”
She smiled.
“Indeed, I am not ill,” she answered; “but I have duties to attend to. Just let me show you this, and then you shall go with me back to mamma.”
She led the way to the edge of the pond and looked into it. I followed, and gazed down into its depths, till my sight was lost in them. I could see no bottom to the rocky shaft.