“None may wholly know what all this means,” answered Joanna; “but upon me has Esther laid the charge to strive that restitution be done, since now the house of Trevlyn has become the friend and champion of the poor and oppressed, and the present knight is a very proper gentleman, well worthy of being the son and the grandson of the house of Wyvern.  This charge she laid upon me five long years agone, when she bid the tribe own me their queen, for that her age and infirmities hindered her from acting longer as such.  Ever since then I have been pondering and wondering how this thing may be done; but I have had to hold my peace, for if but a whisper got abroad and so came to Miriam’s ears, I trow that the treasure, if still it lies hidden in the forest, would forthwith be spirited away once more.”

“Then Miriam knows the hiding place?”

“I say not that, I think not that.  I have watched, and used every art to discover all I may; and I well believe that Miriam herself knows not the spot, but that she knows it lies yet in the forest, and that when the hour is come she and Robin together will bear it away, and keep it for ever from the house of Trevlyn.”

“But sure if they are ever to enjoy their ill-gotten gains it should be soon,” said Cuthbert.  “Miriam is old, and Long Robin can scarce be younger—­”

“Hold!  I have not done.  Long Robin, her husband, was older by far than she.  If the old man who goes by that name be indeed he, he must be nigh upon fourscore and ten.  But I have long doubted what no man else doubts.  I believe not that yon gray-beard is Robin; I believe that it is another who masquerades in old man’s garb, but has the strength and hardihood of youth beneath that garb and that air of age.”

“Marry! yet how can that be?”

“It might not be so hard as thou deemest.  In our tribe our men resemble each other closely, and have the same tricks of voice and speech.  Nay, it was whispered that many of the youths were in very truth sons to Robin; and one of these so far favoured him that they were ever together, and he was treated in all ways like a son.  Miriam loved him as though he had been her own.  Where Long Robin went there went this other Robin, too.  He was as the shadow of the other.  And a day came when they went forth together to roam in foreign lands, and Miriam with them.  They were gone for full three years.  We gave up the hope of seeing them more.  But suddenly they came amongst us again—­two of them, not three.  They said the younger Robin had died of the plague in foreign lands, and all men gave heed to the tale.  But from the first I noted that Long Robin’s step was firmer than when he went forth, that there was more power in his voice, more strength in his arm.  True, he goes about with bowed back; but I have seen him lift himself up when he thought there was none to see him, and stretch his long arms with a strength and ease that are seldom seen in the very aged.  He can accomplish long rides and rambles, strange in one so old; and our people begin to regard him with awe, as a man whom death has passed by.  But I verily believe that it was old Robin who passed away, and that this man is none other but young Robin; and that in him and him alone is reposed the secret of the lost treasure, that he may one day have it for his own.”