Christina,
whose days in the calendar are on the 24th of April and the 24th of
July, and the number of thousands named for the ransom was likewise
four and twenty. Also Herdegen had bid him think of twice the twelve
apostles, and of the twenty-four hours from midnight till midnight
again. It would seem beyond belief to most folks, he said, yet it
was indeed twenty-four thousand, and not hundred, sequins which that
devilish Sultan has asked, as indeed we must know from the letter.
Presently, when he had rested a while, we made him tell us more, and
we learned that the Sultan had been minded to set Herdegen free without
price, and he would have had him led forthwith to the imprisoned King
Janus of Cyprus, to whom he thought he might thus do a pleasure, but
that Ursula Tetzel, who was standing by with her husband, had whispered
to the Sultan that she would not see him robbed of a great profit
forasmuch as that yonder Christian slave--and she pointed to my
brother--was of one of the richest families of her native town, who
could pay a royal ransom for him and find it no great burthen; and that
the same was true of Sir Franz, who was likewise to have been set free.
Hereupon the Sultan, who at all times lacked moneys, notwithstanding the
heavy tribute he levied on all merchandise, commanded that Herdegen and
the Bohemian should be led away again and then he asked this overweening
ransom. Then Ursula took upon herself of her own free will to send
tidings of the Sultan's demands to the slaves' kith and kin, and of her
deep malice had never done so.

That evening we might not hear how and on what authority Eppelein knew
all this, for much talking had wearied him. All we could then learn was
that it was Ursula, and none other, whom the lad would still speak of
as the She-devil, who had plotted the snare which had well nigh cost
my other brother his life. Yet had he left him so far amended that he,
Eppelein, would be glad to be no worse.

Albeit these tidings of Kunz were good to cheer us, our hopes of
ransoming Herdegen were indeed far away, or rather in the realm of
nevermore; even if my grand-uncle were possessed of so great a sum, it
was a question whether he would be willing to pay it; and as for us, we
could never have raised it at the cost of all our fortune. At that time
the Venice sequin and Nuremberg gulden were not far asunder in value,
and what the sum of twenty-four thousand gulden meant any man may
imagine when I