“But he doesn’t want anybody to call upon him, sir.”

“Ah! that’s another matter.  I didn’t know that.  Of course, nobody has a right to intrude upon anybody.  However, as I happen to have come without knowing his dislike to being visited, perhaps you will take him my card, and say that if it is not disagreeable to him, I should like exceedingly to thank him in person for his sermon on the organ last Sunday.”

He had played an exquisite voluntary in the morning.

“Give my message exactly, if you please,” I said, as I followed the man into the hall.

“I will try, sir,” he answered.  “But won’t you come up-stairs to mistress’s room, sir, while I take this to Mr Stoddart?”

“No, I thank you,” I answered.  “I came to call upon Mr Stoddart only, and I will wait the result of you mission here in the hall.”

The man withdrew, and I sat down on a bench, and amused myself with looking at the portraits about me.  I learned afterwards that they had hung, till some thirty years before, in a long gallery connecting the main part of the house with that portion to which the turret referred to so often in Old Weir’s story was attached.  One particularly pleased me.  It was the portrait of a young woman—­very lovely—­but with an expression both sad and—­scared, I think, would be the readiest word to communicate what I mean.  It was indubitably, indeed remarkably, like Miss Oldcastle.  And I learned afterwards that it was the portrait of Mrs Oldcastle’s grandmother, that very Mrs Crowfoot mentioned in Weir’s story.  It had been taken about six months after her marriage, and about as many before her death.

The butler returned, with the request that I would follow him.  He led me up the grand staircase, through a passage at right angles to that which led to the old lady’s room, up a narrow circular staircase at the end of the passage, across a landing, then up a straight steep narrow stair, upon which two people could not pass without turning sideways and then squeezing.  At the top of this I found myself in a small cylindrical lobby, papered in blocks of stone.  There was no door to be seen.  It was lighted by a conical skylight.  My conductor gave a push against the wall.  Certain blocks yielded, and others came forward.  In fact a door revolved on central pivots, and we were admitted to a chamber crowded with books from floor to ceiling, arranged with wonderful neatness and solidity.  From the centre of the ceiling, whence hung a globular lamp, radiated what I took to be a number of strong beams supporting a floor above; for our ancestors put the ceiling above the beams, instead of below them, as we do, and gained in space if they lost in quietness.  But I soon found out my mistake.  Those radiating beams were in reality book-shelves.  For on each side of those I passed under I could see the gilded backs of books standing closely ranged together.  I had never seen the connivance before, nor, I presume, was it to be seen anywhere else.