THE TOWER OF MYSTERY
and his sword beside him, what he used to wear. My uncle said his hair had grown out from under his wig, and his beard was down to the toes of him. My uncle he always upheld that that dead man was no deader than you and me, but was in a sort of fit, a transit, I think they call it, and looked for him to waken into life again some day. But the doctor said not. It was only something done to him like Pharaoh in the Bible afore he was buried."
Alice whispered to Oswald that we should be late for tea, and wouldn't it be better to go back now directly. But he said:
"If you're afraid, say so; and you needn't come in anyway—but I'm going on."
The man who was going for the pig put us down at a gate quite near the tower—at least it looked so until we began to walk again. We thanked him, and he said:
"Quite welcome," and drove off.
We were rather quiet going through the wood. What we had heard made us very anxious to see the tower—all except Alice, who would keep talking about tea, though not a greedy girl by nature. None of the others encouraged her, but Oswald thought himself that we had better be home before dark.
As we went up the path through the wood we saw a poor wayfarer with dusty bare feet sitting on the bank.
He stopped us and said he was a sailor, and asked for a trifle to help him to get back to his ship.
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