"Little Vraagal," continued Pan, looking very serious, "there is, indeed, an evil Devil, but he is far more ugly than I am. Is it not so, Wistik? You know him. Is he not much uglier? Tell us!"
Johannes never forgot the look on Wistik's face as Father Pan asked him this in a loud voice, with a keen, serious regard. The little fellow grew as pale as death, his mouth dropped open, he pressed both hands upon his stomach, and from his trembling lips came the almost inaudible word: "Horrible!"
"Oh, indeed!" said Pan. "Well, I am not that. Sometime Wistik must point him out to you. He looks much more like those foolish people you have just come from than like me."
"Aunt Seréna?" asked Johannes, astounded. "Is she, then, not good and first-rate? Is she a foolish person?"
"Now, now, you dear little Vraagal!" said Pan, in palliation. "Everything is relative. But it is a fact that she looks more like the Devil than I do."
"How can that be?" asked Johannes, in amazement.
Pan grew a little impatient. "Does that puzzle you? Then ask her to show you the little tree she has in her safe, with the golden apples growing on it. Do not forget!"
"Good, good!" shouted Wistik, clapping his hands with delight.
At this moment there came suddenly from the distance an alarming sound—a short, hoarse, resounding roar that echoed through the forest.