e she
believed that I was true and steadfast. And I have kept in every respect
the vow I then made to the Lady Wendula--that she should not find herself
mistaken in me. I remember that evening as if it were only yesterday. To
keep constantly before my eyes the praise my mistress had bestowed upon
me, I ventured to ask my young master' sister to embroider the T and the
S on the cap and the new coat, and the young lady did so that very night.
Since that time these two initials have gone with me wherever our horses
bear us, and as, after the battle of Marchfield, Biberli nursed his
master back to health with care and toil, he thinks he can prove to you,
his sole sweetheart, that he wears his T and S with good reason."

In return for these words Katterle granted her friend the fitting reward
with such resignation that it was robbing the moon not to permit her to
look on. Her curiosity, however, was not to remain wholly ungratified;
for when Biberli found that it was time for him to repair to the Town
Hall to learn whether his master, Heinz Schorlin, needed his services,
Katterle came out of the house door with him.

They found much more to say and to do ere they parted.

First, the Swiss maid-servant wished to know how the Emperor Rudolph had
received Heinz Schorlin; and she had the most gratifying news.

During their stay at Lausanne, where he won the victory in a tournament,
Heinz was knighted; but after the battle of Marchfield he became still
dearer to the Emperor, especially when a firm friendship united the young
Swiss to Hartmann, Rudolph's eighteen-year-old son, who was now on the
Rhine. That very day Heinz had received a tangible proof of the imperial
favour, on account of which he had gone to the dance in an extremely
cheerful mood.

This good news concerning the knight, whom her young mistress had perhaps
already met, awakened in the maid, who was not averse to the business of
matchmaking, so dear to her sex, very aspiring plans which aimed at
nothing less than a union between Eva and Heinz Schorlin. But Biberli had
scarcely perceived the purport of Katterle's words when he anxiously
interrupted her and, declaring that he had already lingered too long, cut
short the suggestion by taking leave.

His master's marriage to a young girl who belonged to the city nobility,
which in his eyes was far inferior in rank to a Knight Schorlin, should
cast no stone in the pathway of fame that was leading him so swiftly
up