THE RUINED MANOR.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 77, 31 March 1928, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE RUINED MANOR.

(Sent by R. SUTCLTFPE, 0.5.8., 26, O'Neill Street, Ponsonby. Age 14.) "Well, what about it? We have all the ingredients for the mixing of a pleasant, rambling day—sunshine, plenty of tuck, freedom, no worry, and a ruined manor set in the shade of ancient oak trees. What about it?"

Master John spoke thus summarily to us as we sat at the breakfast table. "We," consisted of Jessie and Tom, my cousins, and I.

Placing half an egg on his fork Tom looked at it mournfully and shook his head.

"Sparrows' eggs in this dump," lie mumbled, and lifted it into his cadaverous mouth. Then, he continued, "no John, not for me. I'll stay home and try and get a decent feed." "But I would like to go," asserted Jessie. "Same here," said 1 contemplating my bacon with an approving eye. "Fine pigs, they grow up here to get bacon like this."

"Grow!" exclaimed Jessie in great astonishment. I'lien with something .1 could not understand in her eye. "No, Ron. they dou't grow. They hang from the tre6s like apples. "But surely —said I seriously. "Haw! Haw!" Tom guffawed, and I glared at him. "What the ."

"Cut it out Ron," laughed John. "You're not as bad as that, surely. But are you all willing to go out?"

"When I've had a bite of breakfast," agreed Thomas, swallowing another egg-

"Pig!" ejaculated Jessie, and went off to pack the hamper. We had finished our lunch. It was delightful and cool in the shade of the trees, and we felt like staying for ever to idle away the time in this pleasant manner. But the ruins in front invited inspection, and we packed things up ready so that we could spend some time exploring.

John brought forth four candles and four boxes of matches.

"I vote we separate," he said, "and each explore from a different corner. Most of the show is underground, so you'll need these candles. Now, come on."

Wo separated, Tom with half-a-dozen pasties in his pockets in case, as he said, "he got lost and missed tea."

It is hard to explain the feeling I had when I went down the broken steps into the dark cellars below the broken masonry above. When the building is centuries old, and when one's mind is stuffed with tales of mysterious and weird adventures which have occurred to others, one goes about slightly nervons a:id not a little apprehensive as to what one might meet.

I lit my candle and by its glow saw that I was in a small room, bare of furniture or covering. From the other side was a passage. Steadily I advanced fearful of touching some hidden spring and falling through some trap door to death! A draught came up the passage and my candle flickered, casting curious shapes on the wooden wall.

Now, I began to feel I was foolish and must be courageous. So my step became heavier, quicker, and determined. I wa%so engrossed in my thoughts of steeling myself against fear that I forgot caution. Suddenly I struck something. My candle dropped to the floor—a wind whistled around me—and I went hurtling downwards into darkness! Crash! I struck something soft and tumbled over unharmed on to damp mother earth. But that something let forth an unearthly yell—someting like a Red Idian war yell and a Maori haka rolled into one.

The echoes came rolling back. Broken was the silence of the deadly place. Then the something came at me, clawing and yelling. It tore my clothes, my hair, my face, and kept trying for my throat. I, however, realising I'd have to act if I was to come out of the show in one piece, in turn fought the fellow whose coat had been torn off in the melee. Soon I got the better of him and he quietened down. Not one intelligible word had been spoken the whole time; but now I raised my voice and yelled, "Jessie! John!" Two flickering lights came hurrying through the blackness. "Hallo! Hallo! What's wrong, Ron," called John as he and Jessie held up their candles. "I've caught . Good Heavens. Tom!" "Yes,"Tom, you durned thunderbolt," came from the "something." "I wish you couldrt't fight so well, for you've squashed those pasties." So the day ended there. I had, as it happened, collided with a trap-door at the end of the passage, and had fallen through on to Torn, who was on the bottom of the manor. He had been thinking of murderers, etc., and had set to, in order to slay, his supposed slayer. But "all's well