This was true enough; but how find our way to the cathedral and back again to the hotel? We had no desire to repeat that Toledo adventure. The story of the Babes in the Wood is only amusing to those who listen.
"Evidently a very different town from Toledo," replied H. C. "We have only to climb the height to reach the cathedral. Let us play Hare and Hounds. I will drop pieces of paper by way of scent. Or like Hop o' my Thumb scatter stones on the road."
"Wouldn't a silken thread be more poetical?"
"True; but," with a profound sigh, "there is no Fair Rosamund at the end of it. Here we can only worship the antique. Rosamund was not antique."
"But this has one great virtue; it can never disappoint or play you false. And, rare merit, its charms increase with age."
Again he sighed deeply. He had had many disappointments, but then he deserved them. Butterflies flit from flower to flower, until by-and-by they alight on a nettle and it stings: a little allegory always lost upon H. C. The gift of knowing themselves is still denied to mortals.
We left the bridge and found ourselves once more in the quaint octagonal corner; in front of us a narrow turning; a long flight of steps apparently without end; a Jacob's Ladder.
"Leading to Paradise," said H. C. "Let us take it."
"Would you be admitted with all those broken vows upon your conscience?"
The Oracle was silent. With a bold plunge we commenced the ascent: a rugged climb with dead walls about us; twistings and turnings and crooked ways and rough uneven steps; a veritable pilgrimage.