I had accepted a seat in a carriage belonging to some friends in St. Andrews, who were also going to the castle to dine, but who were returning to sleep in their own homes in the town.
It was twilight when we drove up the long avenue, and caught a first glimpse of the exterior. A typical old Scotch castle, very large, with high-peaked roofs and pepper-box turrets, and all built of gray stone.
About an hour before dinner I was conducted to my room. My evening dress was already spread upon the bed, and the housemaid was arranging my toilet articles on the dressing-table.
"I think you will be comfortable here, my dear," said my kind hostess, and I thanked her with a sinking heart as she went away.
As the housemaid prepared to follow her I said, "Am I the only person sleeping on this floor?"
She answered, "You are the only one in this wing, miss."
"Twenty-six bedrooms," answered the housemaid, "but we've shut up most of them. This one has such a good view that Miss Young thought it ought to be used." With that she went away, and I looked round.
Six lighted candles and a big wood fire seemed only to accentuate the profound gloom and depression of the large, irregular room. The very first thing I did was to throw a towel over the face of the mirror on the dressing-table. Then I investigated every nook and corner.
There was a powdering closet formed in a pepper-box turret. The carpet of the room stopped short at its door, and inside the boards looked loose and uneven. I fetched a candle and soon discovered that the floorboards lifted up quite easily, and beneath them was a black yawning hole, an _oubliette_, through which wretched prisoners were cast in days not so long ago.
I replaced the boards, telling myself that in the morning I would have a look at the outside of this black shaft. It probably ended, as most of such places did end in the old Scotch castles, in a big dungeon underground.
Inside my big room there were sloping ceilings, and great beams, and an enormous fireplace had been bricked up to suit more modern requirements. There were two doors, the one I had entered by and another which was locked and keyless. The window, with the view, was hidden by heavy red curtains, and the atmosphere was musty and dank, like that of a vault.