It appeared
that he had got into conversation with an ancient man of the village,
who, probably, knew more--though it was little enough--of the strange
house, than any other person living.
The substance of this knowledge was, that, in the "ancient man's"
youth--and goodness knows how long back that was--there had stood a
great house in the center of the gardens, where now was left only that
fragment of ruin. This house had been empty for a great while; years
before his--the ancient man's--birth. It was a place shunned by the
people of the village, as it had been shunned by their fathers before
them. There were many things said about it, and all were of evil. No one
ever went near it, either by day or night. In the village it was a
synonym of all that is unholy and dreadful.
And then, one day, a man, a stranger, had ridden through the village,
and turned off down the river, in the direction of the House, as it was
always termed by the villagers. Some hours afterward, he had ridden
back, taking the track by which he had come, toward Ardrahan.
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