NILS STENSSON. As truly as I live! Wherefore should I deny it, if I were? NILS LYKKE. But where, then, is Count Sture? NILS STENSSON. [_In a low voice._] Ay, _that_ is just the secret. NILS LYKKE. [_Whispers._] Which is known to you? Is’t not so? NILS STENSSON. [_Nods._] And which I am to tell you. NILS LYKKE. To tell me? Well then,—where is he? [NILS STENSSON _points upwards._ NILS LYKKE. Up there? Lady Inger holds him hidden in the loft-room? NILS STENSSON. Nay, nay; you mistake me. [_Looks round cautiously._ Nils Sture is in Heaven! NILS LYKKE. Dead? And where? NILS STENSSON. In his mother’s castle,—three weeks since. NILS LYKKE. Ah, you are deceiving me! ’Tis but five or six days since he crossed the frontier into Norway. NILS STENSSON. Oh, that was I. NILS LYKKE. But just before that the Count had appeared in the Dales. The people, who were restless already, broke out openly and would have chosen him for king. NILS STENSSON. Ha-ha-ha; that was me too! NILS LYKKE. You? NILS STENSSON. I will tell you how it came about. One day Peter Kanzler called me to him and gave me to know that great things were preparing. He bade me set out for Norway and fare to Östråt, where I must be on a certain fixed day—— NILS LYKKE. [_Nods._] The third night after Martinmas. NILS STENSSON. There I was to meet a stranger—— NILS LYKKE. Ay, right; I am he. NILS STENSSON. From him I should learn what more I had to do. Moreover, I was to let him know that the Count was dead of a sudden, but that as yet ’twas known to no one save to his mother the Countess, together with Peter Kanzler and a few old servants of the Stures. NILS LYKKE. I understand. The Count was the peasants’ rallying-point. Were the tidings of his death to spread, they would fall asunder,—and ’twould all come to nought. NILS STENSSON. Ay, maybe so; I know little of such matters. NILS LYKKE.