man
times. There was the parish church, of course, a good solid wooden
structure, and a collection of houses strung along the dirt paths of the
town. The houses of the rich were, naturally, wooden; the poor built of
baked mud. There were a great many baked-mud structures, and only one
wooden one, besides the church, that Jonas could see.

The paths were winding, but comparatively free from slop. That was
pleasing, he told himself. And the buildings themselves, wood, mud and
stone, clustered in the valley below him as if they were afraid, and
needed each other's protection.

Which, in a way, they did. Jonas reflected on that a trifle grimly,
thinking of the Holy Inquisition with its hierarchy of priests and lay
folk, busily working in Speyer just as it worked in every other town
throughout Offenburg, and throughout the civilized world.

Ordinarily, he would not have given it a thought, beyond a passing sigh
for the ways of the world; he had other business. But now--

He grinned to himself, and the grin turned to a laugh as he started down
the hill. The grislier methods of the Inquisitorial process were
well-known to him by reputation, and soon he might be testing them out
for himself. There was absolutely no way to be sure.

That thought pleased him greatly; after all, he told himself, there was
nothing like a little danger to spice the boring business of living. By
the time he reached the bottom of the hill, he was whistling loudly.

* * * * *

He stopped at the first house, a mud construction with a
badly-carpentered wooden door and a single bare window that looked out
on the street. It smelled, but Jonas went up to the door bravely and
knocked.

There was no answer. He went on whistling "_Fortuna plango vulnera_"
under his breath, and after a time he knocked again.

This time he heard movement inside the house, and nodded to himself in a
satisfied fashion. But almost a minute passed before the head of an old
woman showed itself at the window. She was really extraordinarily ugly,
he thought. She wore a bonnet that did nothing whatever to enhance her
doubtful, wrinkled charms, or to conceal them; and besides, it was
dirty.

"Nobody's here," she said in the voice of a very venomous toad. "Go
away."

Jonas smiled at her. It was an effort. "Madam--" he began politely.

"Nobody's home," she repeated, drawing slightly back from the window.
"You go away, now."

"Ah," Jonas said