"Ay, ay," he called out, "Johnny will be a famous young shaver one of these days;" and with that, he whipped up his horse, and away we went.
The drive up the avenue, for such at the time I judged it to be, and such it proved to be, did not occupy many minutes. The fly came to a stand, and the driver got down and opened the door. "Now, young lady, here you are," he said; and I found myself in front of the main entrance to Deepley Walls.
It was too dark by this time for me to discern more than the merest outline of the place. I saw that it was very large, and I noticed that not even one of its hundred windows showed the least glimmer of light. It loomed vast, dark and silent, as if deserted by every living thing.
The old driver gave a hearty pull at the bell, and the muffled clamour reached me where I stood. I was quaking with fears and apprehensions of that unknown future on whose threshold I was standing. Would Love or Hate open for me the doors of Deepley Walls? I was strung to such a pitch that it seemed impossible for any lesser passion to be handmaiden to my needs.
What I saw when the massive door was opened was an aged woman, dressed like a superior domestic, who, in sharp accents, demanded to know what we meant by disturbing a quiet family in that unseemly way. She was holding one hand over her eyes, and trying to make out our appearance through the gathering darkness. I stepped close up to her. "I am Miss Janet Hope, from Park Hill Seminary," I said, "and I wish to speak with Lady Chillington."
CHAPTER II.
THE MISTRESS OF DEEPLEY WALLS.
The words were hardly out of my lips when the woman shrank suddenly back, as though struck by an invisible hand, and gave utterance to an inarticulate cry of wonder and alarm. Then, striding forward, she seized me by the wrist, and drew me into the lamp-lighted hall. "Child! child! why have you come here?" she cried, scanning my face with eager eyes. "In all the wide world this is the last place you should have come to."
"Miss Chinfeather is dead, and all the young ladies have been sent to their homes. I have no home, so they have sent me here."