"Amen."
"Now for the keys," said Thorold.
Osric knew them all, and taking them, led the liberators down below, into the gloomy corridor from which the dungeons opened on either side. The men shuddered as they stood between these dens of cruelty, from which moans, faint and low, from time to time issued like the sighing of the plaintive wind.
One by one they opened these dens, and took the prisoners out. Many were too weak, from torture and privation, to stand, and had to be supported. They hardly understood at first what it all meant; but when they knew their deliverers, were delirious with joy.
At last they came to the cell where the "crucet-box" was placed, and there they found Herwald. Osric opened the chest, of which the lid was only a framework of iron bars. He was alive, and that was all; his hair was white as snow, his mind almost gone.
"Are the angels come to take me out of Purgatory?" he said.
"Herwald, do you not know me?" said Thorold.
It was vain; they could evoke no memory.
Then they went to the torture-chamber, where a plaintive, whimpering cry struck their ears. In the corner stood a boy on tiptoes; a thin cord attached to a thumbscrew, imprisoning both his poor thumbs, was passed over a pulley in the ceiling, and then tied to a peg in the wall, so that the poor lad could only find firm footing at the expense of the most exquisite pain; and so he had been left for the night, the accursed iron eating into the flesh of his thumbs all the time.