“Oh, if you are going to begin to feel like that,” she exclaimed, “we had better go back at once. I am trembling so that I can scarcely stand.”
I was very far from wishing her to put her threat into execution, so I at once hid my nervousness and replied lightly, though still speaking in low tones—
“You are too silly! Who could blame us for glancing inside an open garden-door? And at worst, you have never said that the Grim House people were at all ogreish! See there, Isabel; do let us go as far as that clump of bushes. I have an idea that from behind them we could see the house.”
I walked on a few steps boldly, my companion following me more leisurely. My idea was correct, as we rounded the clump in question, we did come into view of the house, and—of something else too.
Chapter Five.
An Unexpected Ally.
At some little distance from where we now stood was a sort of terrace-walk, for this side of the house, though not that of the front entrance, was evidently intended to be the best. The windows looking out this way were somewhat wider, one or two reaching to the ground, as if to give easy egress from the rooms within.
At one side of the walk was a carefully kept piece of lawn; on the other—that nearest the house—a border, even at this early season presenting a lovely, and, in contrast to the severity and gloom of the building itself, an almost startling blaze of colour. It was filled with spring flowers, tulips, hyacinths, etc, beautifully arranged, so that the groups and their shades harmonised perfectly together. It was evidently a sheltered spot, and evidently, too, this bit of garden ground was most carefully tended. One felt by instinct that it was somebody’s pet or hobby.