"Dotard, have a care!" cried Goebel, threateningly, "and trifle with me no longer. Tell me where you are going, or----" "Well, well, friend Goebel, I'll tell you; don't be afraid, don't let two such old friends as we are quarrel for a trifle--I'll tell you where I am going, although I must say that I think you seem to take an uncommon interest in the doings of an old man like me, who, though he be an old friend----" "Take care now!" "Well, well, my friend, wait one moment; I'll tell you. I told you before that I would tell you, and I will be as good as my word, if you will have one moment's patience--for patience, friend Goebel, patience, I say, is a virtue that we ought all to cultivate, and which we all of us more or less are sadly wanting in. But to proceed; though, after all, my friend, what hurry can you possibly have to learn so simple a fact? It appears to me that the world has grown wondrously impatient since my time; that is, if everybody is like you, but as I said before----" "Tell me! tell me!" screamed Goebel, seizing his venerable friend a second time by the shoulders. "Well, then, my friend," said Gustav, drawing out his words at a most provoking length, "if I _must_ tell you, and you are quite sure that you have sufficient patience to listen to me, learn that I am going to pay a visit at the house of the Scharfrichter, to have a quiet little gossip. You know I am fond of a nice little gossip. Well, I am just going to have a little chat with that poor young man Leo Wenzel. What do you think? He doesn't know yet that his father is the real murderer, for he lives so far off and no one ever goes near the house to tell him the news, and he is still under the delusion that his father has been murdered and that the assassin has not yet been caught. Poor young man, I shall have to break the news very gently to him, for he will feel it deeply. He must know the truth sooner or later, so I have taken upon myself to be the first to communicate the unwelcome news. "According to the law he will be obliged to take the life of his own father. It will be a dreadful blow to him, poor boy, and I am sure I don't know how he will be induced to act executioner in the present instance. I know not if the law in this case will make an exception and choose someone else in his place; it will be very hard upon him if the law really should insist on being carried out to the very letter. Let us hope that mercy will be shown to the son, but in any case it is a very dreadful affair, so I thought I would just go to comfort him a little, to see how he takes the matter, and give him courage, in case----"