"Ah, I remember now," said Renwick with an air of seriousness which matched their own. "Was it not at Szolnok that Baron Neudeck was killed?"
The old man glanced at the others before speaking.
"And the place is no longer occupied?" asked the Englishman.
"There is a mystery attached to Schloss Szolnok?" asked Renwick, lighting his pipe.
"He asks if there is a mystery," said the woman dully. And then followed as before the strange ceremony of the cross.
"I am a stranger in these parts," Renwick went on, "and no mischief maker. This story interests me. I should like to know----" He paused again as the old man leaned forward toward him, and laid his skinny forefinger along Renwick's knee.
"It is the abode of the devil," he whispered, and then crossed himself again.
"It is not a matter which we talk about in this house. We are poor, hard-working people who fear God. But strange things are happening up yonder night after night. Here in the valley, we no longer go near by day--nor even look."
"Ah, I see. Then the place has long been unoccupied?"
The old man was silent, but the woman, gathering confidence, took up the story.
"It was always a place of mystery--even in the days of Baron Neudeck, who was an evil man. The servants were strangers to our people and spoke not at all. They never came into the valley."
"And they did not come for food--for milk, eggs, butter?"
"Szolnok farm was above the Schloss upon the mountain side. They had what they needed."
"Ah, I understand. And since the death of the Baron?"
"We do not know. We do not go there. Two years ago a young man from this village went there seeking a sheep which had gone astray. He never came back. And the sheep skin was found some days later at the foot of the precipice. And scarcely a month ago, a venturesome young man from Bartfa climbed the road to the castle in the dead of night on a wager. What he saw no one will ever know, for he came running down the road to his companion stricken with terror, and has never spoken of the matter from that day to this. It was a ghost he saw, they say----"
"The Schloss is well within the gorge. I do not go to look, my friend."
"Have there been no lights at night for three years?"
"Then it is only for a month or more that they have been seen?"