Schalk made off as fast as he could when he had finished speaking, for he was afraid of his brother’s strong arm, and Wolf followed him, in a worse temper than his surly father had ever been. Cuno took his brothers’ cruel behaviour so much to heart that he fell ill, and had it not been for the ministrations of Father Joseph and the healing drinks the old woman prepared he must have died. When his brothers heard that he lay at the point of death they gave a banquet, and when they were flushed with wine they made a compact that whoever first heard of Cuno’s death should fire the cannons from his castle to tell his brother the good news. And the one who fired first was to have the best cask of wine in Cuno’s cellar. From this time Wolf kept a servant constantly in the neighbourhood of Hirschberg, and Schalk bribed one of Cuno’s servants to let him know the moment his master was dead. But this servant had more affection for his good, kind master than for the wicked Schalk, and one day he asked the old woman if there were indeed no chance of his master’s recovery, and on her telling him that Cuno was very much better he expressed his joy and told her of the plan the brothers had made. The old woman was very angry, and told Cuno, who, however, would not believe such unnatural conduct, and so the old woman urged him to make a trial and pretend he was dead, and then if the cannons were fired they would, of course, hear them. So Count Cuno sent for the servant his brother had bribed, and bade him ride in haste and tell Schalk that he, Cuno, was at the point of death. As the servant rode out of the gateway, Wolf’s spy stopped him and enquired whither he rode in such hot haste. “Alas!” said the man, “my poor master is at the point of death. It is said he cannot live through the night.” “Indeed!” cried the man and ran to saddle his horse and in a very short space of time he was riding furiously towards Hohenzollern. Such was his speed that, on reaching the gates, his horse fell and he had only time to say--“Count Cuno is dying,” before he became unconscious. [Illustration: _He told her of the plan the brothers had made._ (P. 200.)] Immediately afterwards the cannons of Hohenzollern thundered forth and Wolf and his mother made merry, and congratulated one another on the big cask of wine they would win from Cuno’s cellar. They reckoned on the inheritance of the fine castle, the fish pond, and the beautiful jewels. And all the time the cannons sounded, each shot being followed by a wonderful echo, or what at first they took to be one, for they speedily discovered it was the sound of shot being fired from Schalksberg. “Schalk must have had a spy at Hirschberg too,” Wolf said to his mother with a laugh. “Well, well, we shall have to share the wine as well as the rest of the inheritance.”