The doleful sound came up to me from the direction of the stone footbridge at the southwest corner of the Hall below the chapel.

I went to my window and looked out over the courts and terrace.

Haddon Hall and all things in and about it were wrapped in slumbrous silence.

I waited, and again I heard the hooting of the owl.

Noiselessly leaving my room I descended the stone steps to an unused apartment in the tower from which a window opened upon the roof of the north wing of the Hall.