hould I
give such a minute description, making my reader expect a ghost story,
or at least a nocturnal adventure? I only want him to feel something
of what our party felt as they entered this desolate building, which,
though some hundred and twenty years old, bore not a single mark
upon the smooth floors or spotless walls to indicate that article of
furniture had ever stood in it, or human being ever inhabited it.
There was a strange and unusual horror about the place--a feeling quite
different from that belonging to an ancient house, however haunted it
might be. It was like a body that had never had a human soul in it.
There was no sense of a human history about it. Miss St. John's feeling
of eeriness rose to the height when, in wandering through the many rooms
in search of one where the windows were less broken, she came upon one
spot in the floor. It was only a hole worn down through floor after
floor, from top to bottom, by the drip of the rains from the broken
roof: it looked like the disease of the desolate place, and she
shuddered.

Here they must pass the night, with the wind roaring awfully through the
echoing emptiness, and every now and then the hail clashing against what
glass remained in the windows. They found one room with the window well
boarded up, for until lately some care had been taken of the place
to keep it from the weather. There Robert left his companions, who
presently heard the sounds of tearing and breaking below, necessity
justifying him in the appropriation of some of the wood-work for their
own behoof. He tore a panel or two from the walls, and returning with
them, lighted a fire on the empty hearth, where, from the look of the
stone and mortar, certainly never fire had blazed before. The wood was
dry as a bone, and burnt up gloriously.

Then first Robert bethought himself that they had nothing to eat. He
himself was full of merriment, and cared nothing about eating; for had
he not Miss St. John and Ericson there? but for them something must be
provided. He took his lantern and went back through the storm. The hail
had ceased, but the wind blew tremendously. The coach stood upon the
bridge like a stranded vessel, its two lamps holding doubtful battle
with the wind, now flaring out triumphantly, now almost yielding up the
ghost. Inside, the guard was snoring in defiance of the pother o'er his
head.

'Hector! Hector!' cried Robert.

'Ay, ay,' answered Hector. 'It's no time to wauken yet