'Do you hear the owls?' asked Larry. 'I've heard there are three which are seen every night fleeting over Wellon's Cairn, and that they are the souls of the three women Wellon killed. I've never been there at night, have you, Honor?'
'No, I do not go about at night.'
'I should not like to be on Broadbury after dark, not near the old gibbet hill, anyhow. Listen to the old fellow snoring in the apple-tree. I thought owls slept by day and waked by night, but this fellow is dead asleep, judging by the noise he makes.'
After silence of a few moments, during which they listened to the owls, 'I wonder, Honor,' said the young man, 'that you liked to sit on the mound where Wellon was hung. It's a queer, whisht (uncanny) place.'
'I only sit there by day, and that only now and then when I can get out a bit. I have not been there for some time.'
Then ensued another pause.
'I wish you would tell me one thing,' said the girl, 'yet it is what I have no right to ask. Do you owe Mr. Langford a great deal of money?'
'Oh yes,' answered Hillary carelessly, 'a great deal. He has called it in, and we shall have to pay in a month or two.'
'Can you do so out of your savings?'
'We have no savings. We shall go to Mr. Physick—father and I—and get a mortgage made on the property. It is easily done. I am of age. Father couldn't have done it by himself, but I can join and let him.' He held up his head. He was proud of the consequence gained by consenting to a mortgage.