Edmund Blair Leighton Stitching the Standard painting

Edmund Blair Leighton Stitching the Standard paintingPaul McCormack The Symbol of Man paintingEdmund Blair Leighton God Speed painting
asked, as eagerly as Prince Lir had demanded of her. "Tell me the way, tell me where we must go." She put the cat down on the table and took her hands off him.
The cat made no answer for a long time, but his eyes grew brighter and brighter: gold shivering down to cover the green. His crooked ear twitched, and the black tip of his tail, and nothing more.
"When the wine drinks itself," he said, "when the skull speaks, when the clock strikes the right time—only then will you find the tunnel that leads to the Red Bull's lair." He tucked his paws under his chest and added, "There's a trick to it, of course."
"I'll bet," Molly said grimly. "There is a horrible, crumbly old skull stuck up high on a pillar in the great hall, but it hasn't had anything to say for some time. The clock that stands nearby is mad, and strikes when it pleases—midnight every hour, seventeen o'clock at four, or perhaps not a sound for a week. And the wine—oh, cat, wouldn't it be simpler just to show me the tunnel? You know where it is, don't you?"
"Of course I know," answered the cat, with a glinting, curling yawn. "Of course it would be simpler for me to show you. Save a lot of time and trouble."