I followed my companion without a word along a wide corridor, after which I descended some steps, until I imagined I must be below the level of the earth. Then she opened the door of a compartment, and we entered together.
It was a low-ceiled room, but looked comfortable and well-appointed. A lamp burned brightly on the table, and a cheerful wood fire burned in the chimney place. Before the fire a huge armchair was placed.
"Will you sit here and rest? I will return presently."
Mechanically I obeyed, and a moment later I was left alone. The room, the house—everything was as silent as death. I walked around the apartment, and stamped my feet to assure myself that I was not dreaming. I held my hands before the wood fire, and lifted the logs from place to place so that I might convince myself that I had not entered an enchanted region, such as I had read about in my boyhood. Then I examined the room more closely. I could nowhere discover a window. What did it mean? Had I been removed from one prison to another? Had I been mistaken as to the identity of my deliverer? Why had she kept her face hidden? It must have been her. Who else would have undergone so much?
I sat down in the chair, and stretched my legs wearily. Twenty-four hours before I had sat straining my ears in the Witch's Tower of Launceston Castle, and now I was immured in a far more lonely spot. I had asked no questions because I believed that the woman I loved rode by my side. Had I done right?
A distant rumbling noise reached me. Where was I? To whom did this house belong? By what right had I been brought here?
I heard a knock at the door, and a second later an old man entered.
"If you will follow me, sir, you shall have change of raiment, and water to wash with."
Like one in a dream I followed him, and to my astonishment I found in an adjoining compartment not only clothes but arms. A sword hung by the wall, a pair of pistols lay on a table. The clothes were well made and of good quality as befitted a gentleman.