“When you are almost to the castle, hide until Time goes out. After he has gone, enter, and you will find an old, old woman, whose face is covered with deep wrinkles, and whose eyebrows are so shaggy she will not be able to see you. She is seated on a clock which is fastened to the wall.
“Go in quickly and take off the weights that keep the machinery of the clock in motion. Then ask the old woman to answer your questions. She will instantly call her son to come and destroy you, but because you have stopped the clock by taking the weights he cannot move. Therefore she will be obliged to tell you what you want to know.”
X—TIME AND HIS MOTHER
When the pilgrim finished speaking, Channa climbed the mountain and arrived in the vicinity of the castle quite out of breath. There she waited till Time came out. He was an old man with a long beard, he wore a cloak and carried a scythe, and he had large wings that bore him swiftly out of sight.
Channa now entered the castle, and though she gave a start of fright when she saw the strange old woman, she hastened to seize the weights of the clock and tell what she wanted.
The old woman at once called loudly to her son, but Channa said, “You will not see your son while I hold these clock-weights.”
Thereupon the old woman began to coax Channa, saying: “Let go of them, my dear. Do not stop my son’s course. No one has ever done that before. Let go of the weights, and may Heaven reward you.”
“You are wasting your breath,” Channa responded. “You must say something better than that if you would have me quit my hold.”
“Well then,” the old woman said, “hide behind the door, and when Time comes home I will make him tell me all you wish to know. As soon as he goes out again you can depart.”
Channa let go the weights and hid behind the door. Presently Time came flying in, and his mother repeated to him the maiden’s questions.