ave in a whole year, and he is a very
happy man."

CHAPTER II.

Els went back into the house.

The repulse which she had just received caused her bitter sorrow. Her
father was right. Herr Casper had treated her kindly from a purely
selfish motive. She herself was nothing to him.

But there was so much for her to do that she found little time to grieve
over this new trouble.

Eva was praying in the death-chamber for the soul of the beloved dead
with some of the nuns from the convent, who had lost in her mother a
generous benefactress.

Els was glad to know that she was occupied; it was better that her
sister should be spared many of the duties which she was obliged to
perform. Whilst arranging with the coffin-maker and the "Hegelein,"
the sexton and upholsterer, ordering a large number of candles
and everything else requisite at the funeral of the mistress of an
aristocratic household, she also found time to look after her father
and Countess Cordula, who was better. Yet she did not forget her own
affairs.

Biberli had returned. He had much to relate; but when forced to admit
that nothing was urgent, she requested him to defer it until later, and
only commissioned him to go to the castle, greet Wolff in her name, and
announce her mother's death; Katterle would accompany him, in order to
obtain admittance through her countryman, the Swiss warder.

Els might have sent one of the Ortlieb servants; but, in the first
place, the fugitive's refuge must be concealed, and then she told
herself that Biberli, who had witnessed the occurrence of the previous
evening, could best inform Wolff of the real course of events. But when
she gave him permission to tell her betrothed husband all that he had
seen and heard the day before at the Ortlieb mansion, Biberli replied
that a better person than he had undertaken to do so. As he left his
master, Sir Heinz was just going to seek her lover. When she learned all
that had befallen the knight, she would understand that he was no longer
himself. Els, however, had no time to listen, and promised to hear his
story when he returned; but he was too full of the recent experience
to leave it untold, and briefly related how wonderfully Heaven had
preserved his master's life. Then he also told her hurriedly that the
trouble which had come upon her through Sir Heinz's fault burdened his
soul. Therefore he would not let the night pass without at least showing
her betrothed husband how