pressiveness; and I
wanted only to sit there and be penetrated by the weight of its silence.

"It's the very place for you!" Lanrivain had said; and I was overcome by
the almost blasphemous frivolity of suggesting to any living being that
Kerfol was the place for him. "Is it possible that any one could _not_
See--?" I wondered. I did not finish the thought: what I meant was
undefinable. I stood up and wandered toward the gate. I was beginning to
want to know more; not to _see_ more--I was by now so sure it was not
a question of seeing--but to feel more: feel all the place had to
communicate. "But to get in one will have to rout out the keeper," I
thought reluctantly, and hesitated. Finally I crossed the bridge and
tried the iron gate. It yielded, and I walked through the tunnel formed
by the thickness of the _chemin de ronde_. At the farther end, a wooden
barricade had been laid across the entrance, and beyond it was a court
enclosed in noble architecture. The main building faced me; and I now
saw that one half was a mere ruined front, with gaping windows through
which the wild growths of the moat and the trees of the park were
visible. The rest of the house was still in its robust beauty. One end
abutted on the round tower, the other on the small traceried chapel,
and in an angle of the building stood a graceful well-head crowned
with mossy urns. A few roses grew against the walls, and on an upper
window-sill I remember noticing a pot of fuchsias.

My sense of the pressure of the invisible began to yield to my
architectural interest. The building was so fine that I felt a desire
to explore it for its own sake. I looked about the court, wondering in
which corner the guardian lodged. Then I pushed open the barrier and
went in. As I did so, a dog barred my way. He was such a remarkably
beautiful little dog that for a moment he made me forget the splendid
place he was defending. I was not sure of his breed at the time, but
have since learned that it was Chinese, and that he was of a rare
variety called the "Sleeve-dog." He was very small and golden brown,
with large brown eyes and a ruffled throat: he looked like a large tawny
chrysanthemum. I said to myself: "These little beasts always snap and
scream, and somebody will be out in a minute."

The little animal stood before me, forbidding, almost menacing: there
was anger in his large brown eyes. But he made no sound, he came no
nearer. Instead, as I advanced, he graduall