“No,” she answered. “The original building was more of a castle, with walls and battlements. I can show you the foundations of them still; and the picture, too, of what the place used to be. We are not what we were then. Many a cottage, too, has been built out of this old quarry. Not a stone has been taken from it for the last fifty years, though. Just let me show you one thing, Mr. Walton, and then I must leave you.” “Do not let me detain you a moment. I will go at once,” I said; “though, if you would allow me, I should be more at ease if I might see you safe at the top of the stair first.” She smiled. “Indeed, I am not ill,” she answered; “but I have duties to attend to. Just let me show you this, and then you shall go with me back to mamma.” She led the way to the edge of the pond and looked into it. I followed, and gazed down into its depths, till my sight was lost in them. I could see no bottom to the rocky shaft. “There is a strong spring down there,” she said. “Is it not a dreadful place? Such a depth!” “Yes,” I answered; “but it has not the horror of dirty water; it is as clear as crystal. How does the surplus escape?” “On the opposite side of the hill you came up there is a well, with a strong stream from it into the river.” “I almost wonder at your choosing such a place to read in. I should hardly like to be so near this pond,” said I, laughing. “Judy has taken all that away. Nothing in nature, and everything out of it, is strange to Judy, poor child! But just look down a little way into the water on this side. Do you see anything?” “Nothing,” I answered. “Look again, against the wall of the pond,” she said. “I see a kind of arch or opening in the side,” I answered. “That is what I wanted you to see. Now, do you see a little barred window, there, in the face of the rock, through the trees?” “I cannot say I do,” I replied. “No. Except you know where it is—and even then—it is not so easy to find it. I find it by certain trees.” “What is it?” “It is the window of a little room in the rock, from which a stair leads down through the rock to a sloping passage. That is the end of it you see under the water.” “Provided, no doubt,” I said, “in case of siege, to procure water.” “Most likely; but not, therefore, confined to that purpose. There are more dreadful stories than I can bear to think of”—- Here she paused abruptly, and began anew “—-As if that house had brought death and doom out of the earth with it. There was an old burial-ground here before the Hall was built.” “Have you ever been down the stair you speak of?” I asked. “Only part of the way,” she answered. “But Judy knows every step of it. If it were not that the door at the top is locked, she would have dived through that archway now, and been in her own room in half the time. The child does not know what fear means.”