eart did I leave Ulm! You had, indeed, sworn to quit the
service of the League; but I had no hopes of seeing you so soon. And
then, when Hans informed me, that, on your journey with him to
Lichtenstein, you had been surprised by the enemy on the road, and
dangerously wounded, my heart was almost broken, at the thought that I
could not go to you and nurse you."

Stung with remorse for having given place to the jealousy which the
story of the hostess of the Golden Stag at Pfullingen had created in
his breast, he sunk in his own estimation before the tender love of
Bertha. He sought to conceal his confusion, and related to her, amidst
the interruption of her numerous questions, all that had happened to
him since their separation; the cause which had favoured his quitting
the service of the League with honour; the particulars of his perilous
escape from the enemy's patrole; the kind care which the fifer's wife
and daughter had taken of him, by which he was enabled to prosecute his
journey to Lichtenstein.

Albert's conscience was too honest not to feel embarrassed at some of
Bertha's scrutinising questions; and when she wished to have her
curiosity satisfied upon the subject of his coming to Lichtenstein at
so strange an hour of the night he scarcely knew what to answer. Her
beautiful eye rested upon him with such an expression of inquisitive
penetration, that, though he would gladly have escaped the reproach of
harbouring a momentary idea of her want of fidelity, he would not for
all the world tell her an untruth.

"I will own," he said, with a confused look, "that I was infatuated by
the hostess at Pfullingen; she told me something about you, which I
could not hear with indifference."

"The hostess? about me?" cried Bertha, smiling; "well, but what brought
you, at that late hour of the night, to this place?"

"Never mind, dearest; we'll not think of it any more. I know I acted
like a fool. The exiled knight has quite convinced me how wrong I was."

"No, no," she replied, earnestly, "I am not going to let you escape
so cheap; what had that chatterbox to say about me? tell me
immediately----"

"Well, then, I give you leave to laugh at me as much as you please: she
told me you had another lover, who came to visit you every night,
whilst your father slept."

Bertha blushed; indignation, and the inclination to smile at a
ridiculous story, contended for the mastery on her expressive features.
"Well, I hope," she repli