"The opening is just at the level of the water. It looks so small from the opposite side, that one would think it but the size to admit the passage of a dog; you would think it was caused by the loosening of some stone in the wall -- no more. But yet it is large enough to admit the passage of a human body; and where a body has passed out, sure a body may pass in. There is no lock upon the door from the underground passage to the moat; for what man would be so bold as find his way into the Castle by the grim dungeons which hold such terrible secrets? If thou hast the courage to enter thus, none will bar thy passage --"
"If!" echoed Gaston, whose hand was clenched and his whole face quivering with emotion as he realized the fearful peril which menaced his brother. "There is no such thing as a doubt. Raymond is there. I come to save him."
The girl's eyes flashed with answering fire. She clasped her hands together, and cried, with something like a sob in her voice:
"I knew it! I knew it! I knew that thou wert a true knight that thou wouldst brave all to save him."
"I am his brother," said Gaston simply, "his twin brother. Who should save him but I? Tell me, have I come in time? Have they dared to lay a finger upon him yet?"
"Dared!" repeated the girl, with a curious inflection in her voice. "Of what should they be afraid here in this tower, which has ever withstood the attacks of foes, which no man may enter without first storming the walls and forcing the gates? Thinkest thou that they fear God or man? Nay, they know not what such fear is; and therein lies our best hope."
"How so?" asked Gaston quickly.
"Marry, for two reasons: one being that they keep but small guard over the place, knowing its strength and remoteness; the other, that being thus secure, they are in no haste to carry out their devil's work. They will first let their prisoner recover of his hurts, that he slip not too soon from their power, as weaklier victims ofttimes do."
"Then they have done naught to him as yet?" asked Gaston, in feverish haste. "What hurts speakest thou of? Was he wounded in the fight, or when they surrounded him and carried him off captive?"
"Not wounded, as I have heard, but sorely battered and bruised; and he was brought hither unconscious, and lay long as one dead. When he refused to do the bidding of Peter Sanghurst, they took him down to yon fearsome chamber; but, as I heard when I sat at the hoard with mine uncle and that wicked man, they had scarce laid hands upon him, to bend his spirit to their will through their hellish devices, before he fell into a deep swoon from which they could not rouse him; and afraid that he would escape their malice by a merciful death, and that they would lose the very vengeance they had taken such pains to win, they took him back to his cell; and there he lies, tended not unskilfully by my old nurse, who is ever brought to the side of the sick in this place. Once I made shift to slip in behind her when the warder was off his guard, and to whisper in his ear a word of hope. But we are too close watched to do aught but by stealth, and Annette is never suffered to approach the prison alone. She is conducted thither by a grim warder, who waits beside her till she has done her office, and then takes her away. They do not know how we loathe and hate their wicked, cruel deeds; but they know that women have ere this been known to pity helpless victims, and they have an eye to us ever."