“We can,” said Edred earnestly. “I’ve been thinking about it all the time, ever since we came out of the Tower, and I know the way. I shall want you to help me, Dick. You and one grown-up.” He spoke in the same grim, self-reliant tone that was so new to him.
“One grown-up?” Dick asked.
“Yes. I think Nurse would do it. And I’m going to find out if we can trust her.”
“Trust her?” said Dick. “Why, she’d die for any of us Ardens. Ay, and die on the rack before she would betray the lightest word of any of us.”
“Then that’s all right,” said Edred.
“What is thy plot?” Dick asked; and he did not laugh, though he might well have wanted to. You see, Edred looked so very small and weak and the Tower was so very big and strong.
“I’m going to get Elfrida out,” said Edred, “and I’m going to do it like Lady Nithsdale got her husband out. It will be quite easy. It all depends on knowing when the guard is changed, and I do know that.”
“But how did my Lady Nithsdale get my Lord Nithsdale out—and from what?” Dick asked.
“Why, out of the Tower, you know,” Edred was beginning, when he remembered that Dick did not know and couldn’t know, because Lord Nithsdale hadn’t yet been taken out of the Tower, hadn’t even been put in—perhaps, for anything Edred knew, wasn’t even born yet. So he said—
“Never mind. I’ll tell you all about Lady Nithsdale,” and proceeded to tell Dick, vaguely yet inspiringly, the story of that wise and brave lady. I haven’t time to tell you the story, but any grown-up who knows history will be only too pleased to tell it.