To the children it had always been an object of peculiar, though not unwholesome, mystery. None of them cared to pass it on a stormy day--the wind made such odd noises in its empty corridors and rooms--and they refused point-blank to go within hailing distance of it after dark. But in Jimbo's imagination it was especially haunted, and if he had ceased to reveal to the others what he _knew_ went on under its roof, it was only because they were unable to follow him, and were inclined to greet his extravagant recitals with "Now, Jimbo, you know _perfectly_ well you're only making up." The House had been empty for many years; but, to the children, it had been empty since the beginning of the world, since what they called the "_very_ beginning." They believed--well, each child believed according to his own mind and powers, but there was at least one belief they all held in common: for it was generally accepted as an article of faith that the Indians, encamped among the shrubberies on the back lawn, secretly buried their dead behind the crumbling walls of its weedy garden--the "dead" provided by the children's battles, be it understood. Wakeful ears in the night-nursery had heard strange sounds coming from that direction when the windows were open on hot summer nights; and the gardener, supreme authority on all that happened in the night (since they believed that he sat up to watch the vegetables and fruit-trees ripen, and never went to bed at all), was evidently of the same persuasion. When appealed to for an explanation of the mournful wind-voices, he knew what was expected of him, and rose manfully to the occasion. "It's either them Redskins aburyin' wot you killed of 'em yesterday," he declared, pointing towards the Empty House with a bit of broken flower-pot, "or else it's the ones you killed last week, and who was always astealin' of my strorbriz." He looked very wise as he said this, and his wand of office--a dirty trowel--which he held in his hand, gave him tremendous dignity. "That's just what _we_ thought, and of course if you say so too, that settles it," said Nixie. "It's more'n likely, missie, leastways from wot you describes, which it is a hempty house all the same, though I can't say as I've heard no sounds, not very distinct that is, myself." The gardener may have been anxious to hedge a bit, for fear of a scolding from headquarters, but his cryptic remarks pleased the children greatly, because it showed, they thought, that they knew more than the gardener did.