were only to weave a fresh
flower in her afflicted father's fading garland of joy.

The city clerk accompanied them to the great entrance door of the Town
Hall.

Several jailers and soldiers in the employ of the city were standing
there, and whilst their old friend was promising to do his utmost to
secure Ernst Ortlieb's liberation and recommending the girls to the
protection of one of the watchmen, Eva's cheeks flushed; for a messenger
of the Council had just approached the others, and she heard him utter
the name of Sir Heinz Schorlin and his follower Walther Biberli. Els
listened, too, but whilst her sister in embarrassment pressed her hand
upon her heart, she frankly asked the city clerk what had befallen the
knight and his squire, who was betrothed to her maid. She heard that at
the last meeting of the Council an order had been issued for Biberli's
arrest.

His name must have been brought up during the discussions of the slanders
which had so infamously pursued the Ortlieb sisters, but she could not
enquire how or in what connection, for the sun was already low in the
western sky, and if the girls wished to see their father there was no
time to lose.

Yet, though Katterle had just said that Countess von Montfort was waiting
outside in her great sedan-chair for the young ladies, they were still
detained, for they would not leave the Town Hall without thanking the
city clerk and saying farewell to him. He was still near, but the captain
of the city soldiers had drawn him aside and was telling him something
which seemed to permit no delay, and induced the old gentleman to glance
at the sisters repeatedly.

Eva did not notice it; for Biberli's arrest, which probably had some
connection with Heinz and herself, had awakened a series of anxious
thoughts associated with her lover and his faithful follower. Els
troubled herself only about the events occurring in her immediate
vicinity, and felt perfectly sure that the captain's communications
referred not only to the four itinerant workmen and the three women who
had just been led across the courtyard to the "Hole," and to whom the
speaker pointed several times, but especially to her and her sister.

When the city clerk at last turned to them again, he remarked carelessly
that a disagreeable mob in front of the Ortlieb mansion had been
dispersed, and then, with urgent cordiality, invited the two girls to
spend the night under the protection of his old housekeeper. W