Page:William Le Queux - The Czar's Spy.djvu/224

 CHAPTER XXI

THE CASTLE OF THE TERROR

THE big Finn had, I found, tied up his horses, and in the heavy old boat he rowed me down the swollen river which ran swift and turbulent around a sudden bend and then seemed to open out to a great width.

In the starlight I could distinguish that it stretched grey and level to a distance, and that the opposite bank was fringed with pines.

"Where are we going?" I asked my guide in a low voice. But he only whispered —

"Hush! Excellency! Remain patient, and you shall see the young Englishwoman."

So I sat in the boat, while he allowed it to drift with the current, steering it with the great heavy oars.

The river suddenly narrowed again, with high pines on either bank, a silent, lonesome reach, perhaps indeed one of the loneliest spots in all Europe. Once the dismal howl of a wolf sounded close to where we passed, but my guide made no remark.

After nearly a mile, the stream again opened out into a broad lake where, in the distance, I saw rising sheer and high from the water, a long square building of three stories, with a tall round tower at one corner