e fiend, raising high the flashing knife.

"Now, Kandur, have some sense. Why should _I_ have set it on fire?"

"Because no one else could have known that my money was stored away
there. Who else would have dreamed I had money, but you? You who always
changed my bank-note into silver and gold, giving me one silver florin
for a small bank-note, and one gold piece for a large one. How do I know
what was the value of each?--You knew I collected money. You knew how I
collected, and why--for I told you. My daughter is in a certain
gentleman's house; they are making a fool of her there. They are
bringing her up like a duchess, until they have plucked her
blossoms,--and then they will throw her away like a wash-rag. I wished
to buy her off! I had already a pot of silver and a milk-pail of gold. I
wanted to take her away with me to Turkey, to Tartary, where heathens
dwell; and she would be a real duchess, a gypsy duchess! I shall murder,
rob, and break into houses until I have a pot full of silver, and a pail
full of gold. The gypsy girl will want it as her dowry. I shall not
leave her for you, you white-faced porcelain tribe! I shall take her
away to some place where they will not say 'Away gypsy! off gypsy! Kiss
my hand, eat carrion, gypsy, gypsy!'--Give me my money."

"Kandur."

"Don't gape, or tire your mouth. Give me a pot of silver, and a pail of
gold."

"All right, Kandur, you shall get your money--a pot of silver and a pail
of gold. But now let me have my say. It was not I who took your money,
not I who set the rick on fire."

"Who then?"

"Why those people yonder."

"Topandy, and the young gentleman?"

"Certainly. The day before yesterday evening I saw them in a punt on the
moat, starting for the morass, and I saw them when they returned
again--the rick was then already burning. Each of them had a gun: but I
did not hear a single shot, so they were not after game."

"The devil and all his hell-hounds destroy them!"

"Why, Kandur, your daughter was mad after that young gentleman--she
certainly confessed to him that her father was collecting treasures: so
the young gentleman took off daughter and money too--he will shortly
return the empty pot."

"Then I shall kill him."

"What did you say, Kandur?"

"I shall kill him, even if he has a hundred souls. Long ago I promised
him, when first we met. But now I wish to drink of his blood. Did you
see whether the old mastiff too was there at the robbing?"

"To