“Come, Zoe, it’s safely over, and you’re all right,” said Maurice, as she sat trembling in every limb and unable to move. “They want to send the net down for our things.”
“The rope, Maurice—it’s breaking!” she managed to articulate, grasping his arm to help herself up.
“Oh, you noticed that, did you? That was why I wouldn’t let you come up together. But one of the monks who speaks Thracian says that they often draw up two men at once, and nothing has ever happened yet. The rope is only in its fourth year now, and it’s due to last for six.”
“I hope I shan’t have to go up by it in its sixth year,” said Zoe, forcing a smile. “Where’s Eirene?”
“In a state of collapse inside somewhere, being looked after by the grandmother of all old women. Pull yourself together, Zoe. I think she wants you. And we might as well get out of the way of these reverend gentlemen.”
There was little room in the tower for anything but the rude capstan or windlass which worked the rope and the monks who pushed at its bars, and Zoe tottered out with the help of Maurice’s arm, to find herself in a stone-paved court, with Eirene lying on the stones in a dead faint, and an old woman wailing over her, while a group of monks wavered at a discreet distance, alternately drawn by curiosity and withheld by the consciousness that they ought not to be present.
“I say, what’s this?” cried Maurice. “She wasn’t fainting just now—only rather shaky. Look here, Zoe, can’t you do anything? What’s the proper thing—brandy?”
“Water,” answered Zoe reprovingly, and Maurice shouted for water in English, Latin, Greek, French, and Thracian. It was the French that proved effectual at last, for one of the monks understood sufficiently to summon another old woman with a water-jar.
“Oh, Zoe, you are here!” gasped Eirene, when she opened her eyes. “Stay with me. Don’t let them take me away. I won’t be separated from you and Maurice.”
The French-speaking monk approached Maurice softly. “Pray reassure her Royal Highness,” he entreated. “We have prepared for her the best accommodation in our power, and if she desires to be attended by the other young woman, there is no difficulty. She is to enjoy every indulgence suited to her rank, if it is not inconsistent with her safety.”