Armed with the necessary authority, I found my way down into Monmouthshire, to inspect the premises on the following day; and when I saw Rushmere, I felt still more disposed to be surprised at the opportunity afforded me, and to congratulate myself on the promptitude with which I had embraced it. I found it to be a good-sized country house, comfortably furnished, and, to all appearance, well built, standing in enclosed grounds, and on a healthy elevation; but, notwithstanding its isolated situation, I was too much a man of the world to believe, under the circumstances, that its greatest disadvantage lay in that fact. Accordingly, I peered eagerly about for damp walls, covered cesspools, unsteady joists, or tottering foundations, but I could find none. ‘The chimneys smoke, I suppose?’ I remarked, in a would-be careless tone, to the old woman whom I found in charge of the house, and who crept after me where-ever I went. ‘Chimbleys smoke, sir? Not as I knows of.’ ‘The roof leaks, perhaps?’ ‘Deary me, no. You won’t find a spot of damp, look where you may.’ ‘Then there’s been a fever, or some infectious disorder in the house?’ ‘A fever, sir? Why, the place has been empty these six months. The last tenants left at Christmas.’ ‘Empty for six months!’ I exclaimed. ‘How long is it, then, since the gentleman who built it died?’ ‘Old Mr Bennett, sir? He’s been dead a matter of fifteen years or more.’ ‘Indeed! Then why don’t the owners of the place sell it, instead of letting it stand vacant?’ thought I to myself. But I did not say so to the old woman, who was looking up in my face, as though anxious to learn what my decision would be. ‘No vermin, I hope?’ I suggested, as a last resource. ‘You are not troubled with rats or mice at night, are you?’ ‘Oh, I don’t sleep here at night, sir, thank heaven!’ she answered in a manner which appeared to me unnecessarily energetic. ‘I am only employed by day to air the house, and show it to strangers. I go home to my own people at night.’ ‘And where do your people live?’ ‘Better than half a mile from here, sir, and ours is the nearest cottage to Rushmere.’ And then—apprehensive, perhaps, that her information might prove a drawback to the letting of the property—she added, quickly,— ‘Not but what it’s a nice place to live in, is Rushmere, and very convenient, though a bit lonesome.’ I perfectly agreed with her, the ‘lonesomeness’ of the situation proving no detraction in my eyes.