"But
they don't seem much in a hurry with it either."
"Aunt says it is twenty years since the foundations were laid by the
uncle of the present earl," said Helen; "and then for some reason or
other the thing was dropped."
"Was there no house on the place before?"
"Oh! yes--not much of a house, though."
"And they pulled it down, I suppose."
"No; it stands there still."
"Where?"
"Down in the hollow there--over those trees--about the worst place
they could have built in. Surely you have seen it! Poldie and I used
to run all over it."
"No, I never saw it. Was it empty then?"
"Yes, or almost. I can remember some little attention paid to the
garden, but none to the house. It is just falling slowly to pieces.
Would you like to see it?"
"That I should," returned Bascombe, who was always ready for any new
impression on his sensorium, and away they went to look at the old
house of Glaston as it was called, after some greatly older and
probably fortified place.
In the hollow all the water of the park gathered to a lake before
finding its way to the river Lythe. This lake was at the bottom of
the old garden, and the house at the top of it. The garden was
walled on the two sides, and the walls ran right down to the lake.
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