"Meanwhile, seated in her room in the home turret sat the lovely Lady Elfrida, the picture of woe.Why did her lord tarry? Had she not heard him ride into the courtyard and give his palfrey to the waiting serf? Yet where was he? He was to spring up the stairs lightly as a roebuck of the mountains to welcome her, and now where was he? Little did she guess--"Here Shrimp took the paper and wrote:
"--that a brand-new monoplane was blocking up the stairs, so big that not a roebuck on earth could jump it.But what of the secret of the castle? Was that the secret? No.Why did the wind shriek and the deerhound moan? If you would know this, reader, come with me down the dungeon steps and unbar yonder dark door.For there in the dark recess of that terrible cell lay--"The Shrimp, even although time had not been called, was very glad to leave off here.Robert took the paper.He read the narrative as well as he could, and added these words:
"But I cannot bring my pen to write the word.It was a secret; indeed, the secret of the castle.No wonder that the dog moaned and the wind howled and the Lady Elfrida grieved."The Snarker, who, after all, had begun the wretched game, and whose duty it was, therefore, to pull this ruin of a story together again, ought to have played fair; but instead he went back to what Fizzy had called an "areoplane," spelling not being taught at Oxford.He therefore wrote:
"And meanwhile, what of the aeroplane? Fortunately, the night was short, and there was soon enough light by which to fly, and in a brief time the seneschals and myrmidons had the great machine in the midst of the tourney-ground, all ready for flight.Lord Almeric seated himself and grasped the lever.A firm push from the willing arms of a hundred carles and hinds, and he was in the air.'Ah,' he cried, 'odds bodkins, this is indeed life! Never have I felt such sensations.I will never walk or ride again.I will sell my motorcar and my horses and my boots.Flying is for me for ever!"'
Jack now took the paper:
"Lord Almeric was always a very clever man, and it was nothing to him that he had never flown before.He had studied the pictures of the flying men in the illustrated papers while waiting at the dentist's, and he knew the principles of mechanics.No wonder, then, that he flew with perfect control, circling the home turret, where the Lady Elfrida was still weeping, with the greatest ease, and calling to her messages of comfort, which--"Here the Snarker called "Time!" again, and Mr.Lenox's young brother took the paper:
"--she could not hear.'Come down, good lord, or of a verity thou wilt fall and crack thy coxcomb!' shouted the major-domo from beneath; but the intrepid Almeric heeded not the warning, and only rose higher and higher, nearer and nearer to the stars.And then, suddenly, there was an awful shriek, and his body was seen to be hurtling steadily and surely towards the earth, gaining speed with every revolution.'Help, help!' they cried;'he must be dashed to pieces; nothing can save him.' But at that moment--"Here Horace had to go on.He was not a literary boy, and it took him more than one minute to read all that had gone before.All he could therefore add was:
"--he woke up.'Where am I?' he said.'You have fallen out of bed,' said Lady Elfrida."Poor Hester! her face was a picture of perplexity and indignation when she came to read the story all through.There was clearly no sensible ending possible, and she therefore merely wrote:
"Not to this day has the secret of the Castle been solved, but visitors are still shown, on payment of a shilling each, the place where Lord Almeric dreamed he fell from a flying-machine in the year 1135."And then Mr.Lenox's young brother and his friends took them back to the Mitre, and said good-night.
