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Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy, stories by Frank R Stockton |
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The Light In The Castle |
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On a high hill, in a lonely part of Europe, there stood a ruined castle. No one lived there, for the windows were destitute of glass; there were but few planks left of the floors; the roof was gone; and the doors had long ago rotted off their hinges. So that any persons who should take up their residence in this castle would be exposed to the rain, when there was a storm; to the wind, when it blew; and to robbers, if they should come; besides running the risk of breaking their necks by falling between the rafters, every time they attempted to walk about the house. It was a very solemn, lonely, and desolate castle, and for many and many a year no human being had been known to set foot inside of it. It was about ten o'clock of a summer night that Hubert Flamry and his sister Hulda were returning to their home from an errand to a distant village, where they had been belated. Their path led them quite near to the ruined castle, but they did not trouble themselves at all on this account, for they had often passed it, both by night and day. But to-night they had scarcely caught sight of the venerable structure when Hubert started back, and, seizing his sister's arm, exclaimed: "Look, Hulda! look! A light in the castle!" Little Hulda looked quickly in the direction in which her brother was pointing, and, sure enough, there was a light moving about the castle as if some one was inside, carrying a lantern from room to room. The children stopped and stood almost motionless. "What can it be, Hubert?" whispered Hulda. "I don't know," said he. "It may be a man, but he could not walk where there are no floors. I'm afraid it's a ghost." "Would a ghost have to carry a light to see by?" asked Hulda. "I don't know," said Hubert, trembling in both his knees, "but I think he is coming out." It did seem as if the individual with the light was about to leave the castle. At one moment he would be seen near one of the lower windows, and then he would pass along on the outside of the walls, and directly Hubert and Hulda both made up their minds that he was coming down the hill. "Had we better run?" said Hulda. "No," replied her brother. "Let's hide in the bushes." So they hid. In a few minutes Hubert grasped his sister by the shoulder. He was trembling so much that the bushes shook as if there was a wind. "Hulda!" he whispered, "he's walking along the brook, right on top of the water!" "Is he coming this way?" said Hulda, who had wrapped her head in her apron. "Right straight!" cried Hubert. "Give me your hand, Hulda!" And, without another word, the boy and girl burst out of the bushes and ran away like rabbits. When Hulda, breathless, fell down on the grass, Hubert also stopped and looked behind him. They were near the edge of the brook, and there, coming right down the middle of the stream, was the light which had so frightened them. "Oh-h! Bother!" said Hubert. "What?" asked poor little Hulda, looking up from the ground. "Why, it's only a Jack-o'-lantern!" said Hubert. "Let's go home, Hulda." As they were hurrying along the path to their home, Hubert seemed very much provoked, and he said to his sister: "Hulda, it was very foolish for you to be frightened at such a thing as that." "Me?" said Hulda, opening her eyes very wide, "I guess you were just as much frightened as I was." "You might have known that no real person would be wandering about the castle at night, and a ghost couldn't carry anything, for his fingers are all smoke." "You ought to have known that too, I should say, Mr. Hubert," answered Hulda. "And then, I don't believe the light was in the castle at all. It was just bobbing about between us and the castle, and we thought it was inside. You ought to have thought of that, Hulda." "Me!" exclaimed little Hulda, her eyes almost as big as two silver dollars. It always seems to me a great pity that there should be such boys as Hubert Flamry. |
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