brey, anxiously; but at that instant a
carter appeared at the door with a question for Master Hardy, and
Aubrey was left to his own devices, and the hum and clatter of the
mill, till the clock had struck four; and beginning to think that Hardy
had forgotten him, he was about to set out and reconnoitre, when to his
great joy Leonard himself came hurrying up, and heartily shook him by
the hand.

'Hardy told me you were here,' he said. 'Well done, old fellow, I
didn't think they would have let you come and see me.'

'The girls did make a great row about it,' said Aubrey, triumphantly,
'but I was not going to stand any nonsense.'

Leonard looked a little doubtful; then said, 'Well, will you see the
place, or come and sit in my room? There is the parlour, but we shall
not be so quiet there.'

Aubrey decided for Leonard's room, and was taken through the front door
into a vestibule paved with white stone, with black lozenges at the
intersections. 'There,' said Leonard, 'the office is here, you see,
and my uncle's rooms beyond, all on the ground floor, he is too infirm
to go up-stairs. This way is the dining-room, and Sam has got a
sitting-room beyond, then there are the servants' rooms. It is a great
place, and horridly empty.'

Aubrey thought so, as his footsteps echoed up the handsome but ill-kept
stone staircase, with its fanciful balusters half choked with dust, and
followed Leonard along a corridor, with deep windows overlooking the
garden and river, and great panelled doors opposite, neither looking as
if they were often either cleaned or opened, and the passage smelling
very fusty.

'Pah!' said Aubrey; 'it puts me in mind of the wings of houses in books
that get shut up because somebody has been murdered! Are you sure it
is not haunted, Leonard?'

'Only by the rats,' he answered, laughing; 'they make such an
intolerable row, that poor little Mab is frightened out of her wits,
and I don't know whether they would not eat her up if she did not creep
up close to me. I'm tired of going at them with the poker, and would
poison every man Jack of them if it were not for the fear of her
getting the dose by mistake.'

'Is that what Hardy says you will never put up with?' asked Aubrey; but
instead of answering, Leonard turned to one of the great windows,
saying,

'There now, would not this be a charming place if it were properly
kept?' and Aubrey looked out at the great cedar, spreading out its
straight limbs a