In the temporary absence of the Baronet we were received by his niece, Florrie Wyville, and spent a delightful time as she led us through the many tapestried rooms full of curious old furniture, down carved oak staircases lighted by ecclesiastical-looking casements of stained glass, along broad halls adorned with stags' antlers and suits of armour, out on to stone terraces grey with age and dark with ivy.
"Isn't it a dear old place?" she exclaimed enthusiastically when our first tour of exploration was over. "I have been here only a week, and yet I believe I know more about it even than Uncle Hugh knows. It is more than six hundred years old, and was originally a nunnery."
"And why is it called Silverdale?" I asked.
"There was a silver mine here at one time. I believe part of the Abbey stands over an air shaft belonging to it; and in olden days nuns who broke their vows were thrown down it."
"How horrible," said Daphne with a shudder.
"Not so horrible as walling them up alive like that poor thing in Marmion," Florrie replied, jealous for the good repute of her beloved Abbey.
"Does the shaft still exist?" I asked.
"I think so, but the passage leading to it was bricked up years ago. I lay awake last night thinking of those old days, and fancying I could hear a ghostly procession of nuns rustling along the hall and chanting—— Why, what is the matter, Miss Leslie? you look quite scared."
I diverted the conversation to more cheerful topics, and soon the girls were discussing what characters they should assume in the fancy dress ball to be held at Silverdale on Twelfth-night.
The Baronet was justly proud of his beautiful home, and when, late that night, after the retiring of the guests, we were smoking in the library, he listened with evident pleasure to my congratulations on its perfect preservation unspoiled from the middle ages.