Rosalie stared at her, as well she might.
“Won’t you let me see it?” she asked at length; but Mariana shook her head.
“Indeed it would. Let me see it, Mariana, just for one minute. There can be possibly no harm in that.”
“The room I sew in is very damp for such as you.”
“But I’m stronger than you. I’m accustomed to hard work.”
The other looked at her and smiled, with more sadness than mirth in her expression.
“What strange ideas you get about things, Rosalie. The work I do would kill you in a month.”
“But you will let me come with you, will you not?”
“Yes, if you wish it very much. After tea at six o’clock I will come for you.”
At six o’clock Mariana knocked at the little sitting-room door, and Rosalie opened it, quite ready to accompany her, armed with the box of sweets.
“You must not bring those,” said the elder woman.
“I’m not like you. I’m not fond of sweets, and have no intention of making my fingers sticky.”
Then Rosalie put them down, and followed her in silence and obedience.
They went downstairs together, and took the door opening into the central hall to the right, the one through which Rosalie had not yet passed.
But at the threshold Rosalie stood still. It seemed to her as if a great spider’s web was barring their further progress. A breath of darkness and dampness was wafted out to meet them, and inclination bade her turn back there and then. Mariana evidently noticed nothing of this hesitation; she passed through the door, and held it open for Rosalie to follow. The gigantic cobweb was nothing but delusion evidently, and melted into nothingness.
“Don’t shut the door,” Rosalie whispered; but it had closed silently even as she spoke.
And here was darkness and cold dampness. She heard her heart beat wildly in the stillness, and groped for Mariana’s arm. It seemed cold and lifeless, having no animation.
“Can’t we get a light?” she whispered, with dry lips, and her voice sounded hollow in her own hearing.
That, at least, was reassurance. It was Mariana’s voice, no different from what it ever was, just as subdued and gentle.
By degrees her eyes became accustomed to the intense gloom, and when Mariana turned on the one flickering light, she recognised a length of passage similar to that in the other two wings. But here the doors were all quite low, and made of plain black wood. There was no attempt at adornment. The floor was plain wood, the walls, the ceilings, and everything was dreary, damp, and cold.