Jimbo then described how the children had sung and danced to him, and went on to ask a hundred questions about them. But Miss Lake would give him very little information, and said he would not have very much to do with them. Most of them had been in the House for years and years--so long that they could probably never escape at all. "They are all frightened children," she said. "Little ones scared out of their wits by silly people who meant to amuse them with stories, or to frighten them into being well behaved--nursery-maids, elder sisters, and even governesses!" "And they can never escape?" "Not unless the people who frightened them come to their rescue and _run the risk of being caught themselves_." As she spoke there rose from the depths of the house the sound of muffled voices, children's voices singing faintly together; it rose and fell exactly like the wind, and with as little tune; it was weird and magical, but so utterly mournful that the boy felt the tears start to his eyes. It drifted away, too, just as the wind does over the tops of the trees, dying into the distance; and all became still again. "It's just like the wind," he said, "and I do love the wind. It makes me feel so sad and so happy. Why is it?" The governess did not answer. "How old am I _really_?" he went on. "How can I be so old and so ignorant? I've forgotten such an awful lot of knowledge." "The fact is--well, perhaps, you won't quite understand--but you're really two ages at once. Sometimes you feel as old as your body, and sometimes as old as your soul. You're still connected with your body; so you get the sensations of both mixed up." "Then is the body younger than the soul?" "The soul--that is yourself," she answered, "is, oh, so old, awfully old, as old as the stars, and older. But the body is no older than itself--of course, how could it be?" "Of course," repeated the boy, who was not listening to a word she said. "How could it be?" "But it doesn't matter how old you are or how young you feel, as long as you don't hate me for having frightened you," she said after a pause. "That's the chief thing." He was very, very puzzled. He could not help feeling it had been rather unkind of her to frighten him so badly that he had literally been frightened out of his skin; but he couldn't remember anything about it, and she was taking so much trouble to save him now that he quite forgave her. He nestled up against her, and said of course he liked her, and she stroked his curly head and mumbled a lot of things to herself that he couldn't understand a bit.