ion to convince her of the folly of her
plan. After his arguments were exhausted he raised his voice louder. As
usual, when excited by anger, he swung his lower right arm to and fro,
feeling the prominent muscles with his left hand. But Kuni remained
resolute, and when he at last perceived that his opposition only
increased her obstinacy, he exclaimed:

"Then rush on to your destruction! The day will come when you will see
where you belong. If only it doesn't arrive too late. A man grows twelve
and a woman thirty-six months older every year."

With these words he turned his back upon her, and the clown brought the
amount of wages which was due.

Many an eye grew dim with tears when Kuni bade farewell to her
companions. Shortly after sunset she was welcomed to Frau Schurstab's
house.

The first greeting was friendly, and she received nothing but kindness
and indulgent treatment afterward. She had a sunny chamber of her own,
and how large and soft her bed was! But while, when on the road with
Loni's band, if they could reach no town, she had often slept soundly and
sweetly on a heap of straw, here she spent one restless night after
another.

During the first a series of questions disturbed her slumber. Was it
really only the desire to take her from her vagabond life which had
induced Lienhard to open this house to her? Did he not perhaps also
cherish the wish to keep her near him? He had certainly come to her with
Frau Schurstab to protect her reputation. Had it not been so he might
have left the matron at home; for Loni and everybody in the company knew
that she never troubled herself about gossip. Last year she had obtained
a leave of absence from Loni, who was making a tour of the little Frank
towns, and spent the carnival season in revelry with a sergeant of the
Nurembreg soldiers. When the booty he had gained in Italy was squandered,
she gave him his dismissal. Her reputation among her companions was
neither better nor worse than that of the other strolling players who,
like her, were born on the highway, yet she was glad that Lienhard had
tried to spare her. Or had he only come with the old noblewoman on
account of his own fair name?

Perhaps--her pulses again throbbed faster at the thought--he had not
ventured to come alone because some feeling for her stirred in his own
heart, and, spite of his beautiful young wife, he did not feel safe from
her. Then Fran Schurstab was to serve as a shield. This conjecture