n in streams, mingled with snow.
The further we went the worse the roads were, and yet when my companions
turned at the city-gate to ride homewards again, a strange, fierce
confidence came upon me. Whether it were that the wet which ran off from
me and my stout horse had singularly refreshed me, or whether it was the
steadfast purpose I had set as I rode along, to risk my all to the end
that I might redeem my brethren, I know not. But to this hour I mind me
that, as I rode in through the dark streets, my heart beat high with
contentment, and that had I been such another man as Herdegen I might
have been ready enough to pick a quarrel with the first who should have
said me nay.

Thus I fared on past my grand-uncle's house; there I beheld from afar a
lighted lantern, as it were a glow-worm at midsummer, moving along the
street, and when I perceived that it was none other than old
Henneleinlein who carried it, I put my horse, which till now had been
wading through the mire step by step, to a swift gallop, as fast as he
might go, and the servingman behind me, passing close by her. And what
simple glee was mine when our horses splashed the old woman from head to
foot, inasmuch as I wist for certain that she could have stolen to my
grand-uncle's house at that late hour to no end but to reveal whatsoever
she might have picked up from her friend and gossip at the forest-lodge.

Thus I reached home in better cheer than I had hoped; and when Susan told
me that Cousin Maud was in the kitchen ordering the supper, I crept
up-stairs, hastily changed my wet raiment, sent forth my man to tell Ann
that she was to come to me, and then, in the best chamber, I fetched
forth the elecampane wine which I had ever found the best remedy when my
cousin needed some strength. Nor was my care in vain; for when I had told
her, little by little, as it were in small doses, all the tidings I had
heard yesterday, and ended with the great and cruel price demanded by the
Sultan, she shrieked aloud and clasped her hands to her heart in such
wise that I was verily in great fear. Then the elecampane wine did good
service; yet was it not till she had drunk of it many times that her
tongue spoke plainly again. And presently, when she was able to wag it,
it went on for a long time with no pause nor rest, in sheer impatience
and godless railing.

When she had thus relieved her mind, she began pacing up and down the
floor on one and the same plank, like a lion