Wolf had only half listened to this outburst of delight, for he had reserved until the last his best offering--a sky-blue turquoise breastpin set with small diamonds. It brought him enthusiastic thanks, and Barbara even allowed him to fasten the magnificent ornament with his own fingers, which moved slowly and clumsily enough. Then she hurried into her chamber to bring the hand-mirror, and when in an instant she returned and, at her bidding, he held the shining glass before her, she patted his cheeks with their thin, fair, pointed beard, and called him her faithful little Wolf, her clear, stupid pedant and Satan in person, who would fill her mind with vanity. Finally, she laid the piece of velvet over the back of a chair, let it fall down to the floor, and threw the bands of fur upon it. Every graver word, every attempt to tell her what he expected from her, the girl cut short with expressions of gratitude and pleasure until her father returned from the suffering Ursel. Then, radiant with joy, she showed the old man her new treasures, and the father’s admiration and expressions of gratitude were not far behind the daughter’s. It seemed as though Fate had blessed the modest rooms in Red Cock Street with its most precious treasures. It might be either Wolf’s return, the hopes for his daughter which were associated with it in the crippled old warrior’s heart, or the unexpected costly gifts, to which Wolf had added for his old friend a Netherland drinking vessel in the form of a silver ship, which had moved the old gentleman so deeply, but at any rate he allowed himself to be tempted into an act of extravagance, and, in an outburst of good spirits which he had not felt for a long time, he promised Wolf to fetch from the cellar one of the jugs of wine which he kept there for his daughter’s wedding. “Over this liquid we will open our hearts freely to each other, my boy,” he said. “The night is still long, and even at the Emperor’s court there is nothing better to be tasted. My dead mother used to say that there are always more good things in a poor family which was once rich than in a rich one which was formerly poor.” CHAPTER V. The captain limped out into the cellar, but Barbara was already standing behind the table again, moving the irons. “When I am rich,” she exclaimed, in reply to Wolf, who asked her to stop her work in this happy hour and share the delicious wine with him and her father, “I shall shun such maid-servant’s business. But what else can be done? We have less money than we need to keep up our position, and that must be remedied. Besides, a neatly crimped ruff is necessary if a poor girl like me is to stand beside the others in the singing rehearsal early to-morrow morning. Poor folks are alike everywhere, and, so long as I can do no better--but luck will come to me, too, some day--this right hand must be my maid. Let it alone, or my iron will burn your fingers!”