Then upon the shaky wooden steps Otto ran without waiting for a
second thought, for he had often gazed at those curious
buildings hanging so far up in the air, and had wondered what
they were like. Round and round and up and up Otto climbed,
until his head spun. At last he reached a landing-stage, and
gazing over the edge and down, beheld the stone pavement far,
far below, lit by a faint glimmer of light that entered through
the arched doorway. Otto clutched tight hold of the wooden rail,
he had no thought that he had climbed so far.

Upon the other side of the landing was a window that pierced the
thick stone walls of the tower; out of the window he looked, and
then drew suddenly back again with a gasp, for it was through
the outer wall he peered, and down, down below in the dizzy
depths he saw the hard gray rocks, where the black swine,
looking no larger than ants in the distance, fed upon the refuse
thrown out over the walls of the castle. There lay the moving
tree-tops like a billowy green sea, and the coarse thatched
roofs of the peasant cottages, round which crawled the little
children like tiny human specks.

Then Otto turned and crept down the stairs, frightened at the
height to which he had climbed.

At the doorway he met Mother Hilda. "Bless us," she cried,
starting back and crossing herself, and then, seeing who it was,
ducked him a courtesy with as pleasant a smile as her forbidding
face, with its little deep-set eyes, was able to put upon
itself.