Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/277

Rh huge lock which I could just discern at the center of a pair of massive iron gates. A moment later he had the gates swung open and was tooling the car slowly in past them. Then he again stepped out, closed the gates, locked them, and climbed into the seat beside me.

We went along very slowly, this time, and he kept peering ahead through the darkness. We were no longer crunching over a hard roadway, I noticed, but weaving our way in past tree-trunks and shrubbery over the close-cut grass of a lawn. I could see dimly outlined flower-beds, and borders of bushes. Then we swung in under the branches of a huge tree, pushing our way in past screening shrubbery that brushed the side of the car. Then we came to a stop.

"Where are you taking me?" I asked, as I sat up and tried to stare out through the leafy silence that suddenly enisled us. In the distance, toward the river, I could just make out the vague gray pile of a house. It seemed very big. It also seemed to have many gables.

"Where are you taking me?" I repeated in my best Bertha-The-Beautiful-Cloak-Model tones, as Wendy Washburn stepped down out of the car.

"To the Big House up the River!" responded my