THE LADY OF THE RED ADMIRALS
"All day within the dreamy house
The doors upon their hinges creak'd,
The blue fly sung in the pane; the mouse
Behind the mouldering wainscot shrieked,
Or from the crevice peer'd about.
Old faces glimmer'd thro' the doors,
Old footsteps trod the upper floors,
Old voices called her from without."—Mariana.
My eyes had been occupied with the grey chimneys below, among the Spanish chestnuts, at the very moment when I slipped on the northern face of Skirrid and twisted my ankle. This indeed explains the accident; and the accident explains why my interest in the house with the grey chimneys suddenly became a personal one. Five miles separated me from my inn in Aber town. But the white smoke of a goods train went crawling across the green and cultivated plain at my feet; and I knew, though I carried no map, that somewhere under the slope to my left must hide the country station of Llanfihangel. To reach it I must pass the house, and there, no doubt, would happen on someone to set me on the shortest way.
So I picked up my walking-stick and hobbled down the hillside, albeit with pain. Where the descent eased a little I found and followed a foot-
