But, had they known it, there was a way of access to Wat. As they came out of the prison gates they met Barra. The provost-marshal, with a gloomy countenance, informed them that the prince took a very serious view of the affair of their cousin. However, he was in hopes that the sentence, though severe and exemplary, would not in any case be death. Probably, however, it might involve a very long period of imprisonment. "The prince and his council have resolved that an example must be made. There have been, they say, far too many of these brawls in the army. It is such occurrences which breed ill-blood betwixt the soldiers and the townsfolk." "But in that case," said Maisie, "why not persuade the prince to make an example of somebody else--not, surely, of our cousin Wat?" Barra shrugged his shoulders. "I am afraid," he said, softly, "that we cannot always arrange matters so that the penalties shall fall on shoulders whose sufferings will not hurt us. But you, dear ladies, can wholly trust me to use all my influence, so that your friend may soon find himself again at liberty." Thus talking, they had turned to the right, and were now walking down the Street of the Prison. Maisie went a little ahead with her hand on her husband's arm, thinking that perhaps if Kate were left to herself she might be able to move the provost-marshal to kindlier purposes. Barra lingered as much as he could, in order to separate Kate and himself as widely as possible from the pair in front. They passed close to Wat's window, and the prisoner watched them go by with black despair in his heart. As they reached the gloomy angle of the prison, Barra indicated, with a wave of his hand, a remarkable gargoyle in the shape of a devil's head, frowning from the battlements of the gray, beetling tower. Through the closed bars of his window Wat noticed the gesture, as Barra intended that he should. "My God!" he cried aloud, to the deaf walls, "he has brought her this way to gloat with her over my prison-house!" And he flew at the bars of his window, striking and shaking them till his hands were bruised and bleeding. "Let me get out! God in heaven! Let me get out--that I may kill him!" he cried, in the madness of agony. But the bars resisted his utmost endeavor. Not so much as a particle of mortar stirred, and after spending all his strength in vain, Wat fell back on his hard pallet utterly exhausted, and lay there for hours in a vague and dazed unconsciousness. The sullen, tranced hours verged towards evening, and Wat still lay motionless. The keeper had twice been to his cell with food. But finding on the occasion of his second visit the previous supply of bread and water untouched, he had merely laid down the small loaf of black bread which was served out to the prisoners every night, and so departed. At intervals a low voice seemed to steal into Wat's cell through the silence of the prison. "A friend would speak with you--a friend would speak with you."