His gaiety was only for others: a grandmother's eyes could not be deceived.
While the others were engaged with their own happiness, the old lady took Lorand's hand and, without a word of "whither," they went down together to the garden, to the stream flowing beside the garden: to the melancholy house built on the bank of the stream.
Ten years had passed and the creeper had again crawled over the crypt door: the green leaves covered the motto. The two juniper trees had bowed their green branches together over the cupola.
They stayed there, her head leaning on his bosom.
How much they must have said to one another, tacitly, without a single word! How they must have understood each other's unspoken thoughts!
Deep silence reigned around: but within, inside the closed, rusted, creeper-covered door, it seemed as if someone beckoned with invisible finger, saying to the elder boy, "one great debt is not yet paid."
One hour later they returned to the house, where they were welcomed by boisterous voices of noisy gladness—master and servant were all merry and rejoicing.
"I must hasten on my way," said Lorand to his mother.
"Whither?"
"Back to Lankadomb."