After all, now I was a captive. And had I not read, only the week before, of the ordeals and the triumph of Marianna, the Captive of the Abruzzi? She was imprisoned by her wicked cousin in order to force her to make over her fortune to him. A strangely similar plight to mine! Yet it was not my fortune (for I had none) which was at stake, but my Life; and while Marianna had friends and a lover, Verocchio, who fought for her release, I had no one. Except for Hildi, of course.

I sat down, as the key turned in the lock and my Imprisonment began, and refused to acknowledge the Tears that coursed as free as the mountain torrents down my cheeks. I sat, in fact, as if I were a Princess defying her executioners—with a straight back and my hands folded in my lap and my head held high; and I blessed the memory of dear Miss Davenport, and her insistence that young ladies should comport themselves with Great Dignity even under the most Trying Circumstances.

I comported myself thus for about a minute, and then I could bear it no longer and lay down and cried properly.

It was a Horrid room. The window had not been cleaned since the invention of glass, and, besides, was barred with rusty iron rods set deeply into the stone. The bare floor was covered in dust; and such a jumble of objects filled the place as had never, I daresay, been seen since before the Flood.

Being thoroughly cold and tired, I tried to sleep. There was a large tapestry draped over the back of a broken-down couch, and I might have covered myself with it for warmth had it not been for the picture it showed—a female Saint, I think, undergoing Circumstances even more Trying than mine—which made me extremely uneasy. So I bundled it up and thrust it out of sight behind an oak cabinet, and lay and shivered for a long time.

But I could not sleep. I might have occupied my mind usefully with Improving Thoughts, but the only Improvement I could imagine then was a pair of wings, to enable me to fly to freedom. And, of course, a Head for Heights. I cleared the dust from the window and peered out hopefully, but there was nothing but a Horrid Precipice, with jagged crags several thousands of feet below.