Pharold's brow grew as dark as a thundercloud. "On, woman, on with your story," he cried, "and turn not aside to babble of the past. What have you or I to do with the past? You were the same then that you are now, only that the vices and follies of youth have given place to the vices and follies of age."
"Well, well, I'm sure I'm telling my story as quickly as it can be told," replied Mother Gray; "but as I was saying, you know the windows well enough, and know that any one that is at all strong could knock off two or three of the bars, and let the boy out in a minute. Any one could do it."
"Oh, but he said that nobody but Pharold must come," cried Lena, eagerly, forgetting for the moment all caution, and then reddening, like the morning sky, as soon as she had spoken.
"Ha!" cried Pharold, turning his keen dark eyes full upon her, "said he so? and how know you that he did say so, Lena? Ha!"
The poor girl turned redder and redder, and looked as if she would have sunk into the ground, while Pharold still gazed sternly upon her, as if waiting an answer; but the ready cunning of the old woman came to her aid with a lie. "How does she know that he said so?" cried the beldam: "how should she know it but by my telling her?"
Lena heard the falsehood more willingly than she would have spoken it, though by her silence she made it her own, as much as if her lips had given it utterance.
"'Tis well, 'tis well," said Pharold, with a bitter smile curling his lip,--"'tis well. So he said that none but Pharold should come? Now tell me, woman, if your tongue be not so inured to falsehood that it cannot speak truth,"--Lena burst into tears, and crept back to her tent, while Pharold went on,--"tell me why this boy said that none but Pharold must come, when any one else could remove the bars as well?"
"Because he said that any one else who did not know the park might make some mistake," replied the old woman, "and so ruin both himself and poor Will."
Pharold mused for a moment or two and then asked, "Was all quiet when you went?"
"As quiet as a dead sheep," answered the old woman, with a grin.