"I did all that a poor helpless man might do when his feudal lord was on the side of the enemy, and met every prayer and supplication either with mockery or blows. I soon saw it all too well. Sir Hugh was under the spell of the wicked old man. What was my boy's soul to him? what my agony? Nothing -- nothing. The wizard had coveted the beautiful boy. He had doubtless made it worth my master's while to sell him to him; and what could I do? I tried everything I knew; but who would listen to me? Master Bernard de Brocas of Guildford, whom I met upon the road and begged to listen to my tale, promised he would see if something might not be done. I waited and waited in anguish, and hope, and despair, and there came a day when his palfrey stopped at my door, and he came forward himself to speak with me. He told me he had spoken to the Master of Basildene, and that he had promised to restore me my son if I was resolved to have him back; but he had told the good priest that he knew the boy would never be content to stay in a woodland cottage with an unlettered father, when he had learned what life elsewhere was like. But I laughed this warning to scorn, and demanded my boy back."
"And did he come?"
A strange look swept over the old man's face. His hands were tightly clinched. His voice was very low, and full of suppressed awe and fury.
"Ay, he came back -- he came back that same night -- but so changed in those few months that I scarce knew him. And ah, how he clung to me when he was set down at my door! How he sobbed on my breast, entreating me to hold him fast -- to save him -- to protect him! What fearful tales of unhallowed sights and sounds did his white lips pour into my ears! How my own blood curdled at the tale, and how I vowed that never, never, never would I let him go from out my arms again! I held him fast. I took him within doors. I fastened the door safely. I fed him, comforted him, and laid him in mine own bed, lying wakeful beside him for fear even then that he should be taken from me; and thus the hours sped by. But the rest -- ah, how can I tell it? It wrings my very heart. O my child, my son -- my own heart's joy!"
The old man threw up his arms with a wild gesture of despair, and there was something in his face so terrible that the twins dared ask him no question; but after that one cry and gesture, the stony look returned upon his face, and he went on of his own accord.
"Midnight had come. I knew it by the position of the moon in the heavens. My boy had been sleeping like one dead beside me, never moving or stirring, scarce breathing; and I had at last grown soothed and drowsy likewise. I had just fallen into a light sleep, when I was aroused by feeling Roger stir beside me, and hastily sit up in the bed. His eyes were wide open, and in the moonlight they seemed to shine with unnatural brilliance. It was as if he were listening -- listening with every fibre of his being, listening to a voice which he could hear and I could not; for he made quick answers. 'I hear, Sire,' he said, in a strange, muffled voice. And he rose suddenly to his feet and cried, 'I come, Master, I come.' Then a great rage and fear possessed me, for I knew that my boy was being called by some foul spirit, and that he was bewitched. I sprang up and seized him in my arms. 'Thou shalt not go!' I cried aloud. 'He has given thee back to me. I am thy father. Thy place is here. I will not let thee go!' But I might have been speaking to a dead corpse for all the understanding I received. My boy's eyes were opened, but he saw me not. His ears, that heard other voices, were deaf to mine. He struggled fiercely against my fatherly embrace; and when I felt the strength that had come into that frame, so worn and feeble but a few short hours ago, then I knew that it was the devil himself who had entered into my child, and that it was his voice that was luring him back to his destruction. O my God! May I never have to live again through the agony of that hour in which I fought with the devil for my child, and fought in vain. Like one possessed (as indeed he was) did he wrestle with me, crying out wildly all the while that he was coming -- that he would quickly come; hearing nothing that I could hear, seeing nothing that I could see, and all the time struggling with me with a strength that I knew must at last prevail, albeit he was but a tender child and I a man in the prime of manhood's strength. But the devil was in him that night. It was not my boy's own hand that struck the blow which forced me to leave my hold, and sent me staggering back against the wall. No, it was but the evil spirit within him; and even as I released him from my embrace, he glided to the door, undid the fastenings, and still calling out that he was coming, that he would be there anon, he slipped out into the still forest, and vanished amongst the trees."
"Did he return to Basildene?"
"Ay, like a bird to its nest, a dog to its master's home. Spent and breathless, despairing as I was, I yet gathered my strength and followed my boy -- weeping and calling upon his name, though I knew he heard me not. Scarce could I keep the gliding figure in sight; yet I could not choose but follow, lest some mischance should befall the child by the way. But he moved onwards as if he trod on air, neither stumbling nor falling, nor turning to the right hand or to the left. I watched him to the end of the avenue of trees that leads to Basildene. As he reached it a dark figure stepped forth, and the child sank to the ground as if exhausted. There was the sound of laughter -- fiends' laughter, if ever devils do laugh. It chilled the very blood in my veins, and I stood rooted to the spot, whilst the hair of my head stood erect. The dark form bent over the boy and seemed to raise it.
"'You shall suffer for this,' I heard a cruel voice say in a hissing whisper; 'you will not ask to leave again!' and at those evil words a cry of anguish -- a human cry -- broke from my boy's lips, and with a yell of fury I sprang forward to save him or to die with him. But what happened then I know not. Whether a human hand or a fiend's struck me down I shall never now know. I remember a blow -- the sense that hell's mouth was opening to receive me; that the mocking laughter of devils was in my ears. Then I knew no more till (they tell me it was many weeks later) I awoke from a long strange sleep in yon cabin where I live. An old woodman had found me, and had carried me there. Sir Hugh had given him a few silver pieces to take care of me. He had filled my place, and my old home was occupied by another; but had it not been so, no power on earth would have taken me back there. I had grown old in one night. I had lost my strength, my cunning, my heart. I stayed on with the old man awhile, and as he fell sick and died when the next snow fell upon the ground, Master Bernard de Brocas appointed me as woodman in his stead, and here I have remained ever since. I know not how the time has sped. I have no heart or hope in life. My child is gone -- possessed by fiends who have him in their clutches, so that I may never win him back to me. I hate my life, yet fear to die; for then I might see him the sport of devils, and be, as before, powerless to succour him. I have long ceased to be shriven for my sins. What good to me is forgiveness, if my child will be doomed to hellfire for evermore? No hope in this world, no hope after death. Woe is me that ever I was born! Woe is me! woe is me!"
The energy which had supported the old man as he told his tale now appeared suddenly to desert him. With a low moan he sank upon the ground and buried his face in his hands, whilst the boys stood and gazed at him, and then at one another, their faces full of interest and sympathy, their hearts burning with indignation against the wicked foe of their own race, who seemed to bring misery and wrong wherever he moved.