“I do, precisely,” replied Allan.
“Och! tell us, then—tell us!” said Rory.
“Ay, do,” said Ralph. “I shall lean against the window here and look out, for the view is delightful, but I’ll be listening all the same.”
“Well, then,” said Allan, “I made this little room my study for a few months last summer, and I spilt some ink there.”
“Now, indeed, indeed,” cried romantic Rory, “that is a shame to put us off like that. Never mind, Ralph; we know it is a blood-stain, and if Allan won’t tell us the story, then, we’ll invent one. Sure, now,” he continued, “I’d like to sleep here.”
“You’d catch your death of cold from the damp,” said Allan.
Rory wheeled him right round to the light, and gazed at him funnily from top to toe, and from toe to top.
“You’re a greater curiosity than the fine old castle itself,” said Rory; “and I don’t believe there is an ounce of romance in the whole big body of you. Now, if the place was mine, there isn’t a room—why, what is that?”
“That’s the gong,” said Allan, “and it says plainly enough, ‘Get r-r-r-r-ready for dinner.’”
“Well, but,” persisted Rory, “just before we go down below show us the corridor where the ghost walks at midnight, and the door through which it disappears.”