“Take this fellow out,” I commanded. “Take him to the dungeon. Keep him snug on prison fare for the nonce. He is not to die.” “Not to die!” faltered Adolf, almost dropping his tall halberd. “A proven robber!” “I have my reasons. Rüdiger can take down his rope.” “But at least, your Grace will graciously order his nose to be cut off flush with his face,” urged my lieutenant, still blinking. “Not even that.” I drew money from my pouch. “Take these ten gulden to Lampe and tell him these will salve his wound. Tell those cackling geese in the hall that for high reasons of policy, too profound for them to know, the execution is postponed. Now hale him out.” “Oh! Countly Grace! Countly Grace!” Gunter was bawling in ecstacy, “you give me life. You are sparing me! I am your slave forever! All the Saints prosper you! May you--” “Trot on, ape,” ordered Adolf with a kick, “and take that face of yours down to the dungeon. Holy Wounds! But you could look the part of the devil at the miracle play, and without a mask, either.” Out they went, and Moritz turned to me, wondering. “Mary and all angels!” he swore to me in his turn. “What are you doing, Walter?” I seized his hands and almost danced with him round the room. “Do you not see? Through this fellow’s Trude I can learn all that happens at the convent. I might even some day--” He clapped his hand over my mouth. “Hush!” he enjoined; “playing with a nun is playing with fire in a magazine.” “I know, I know.” I shot back to him, “I will be prudent. I will be wise. But one thing I have which I had not an hour ago.” “And what is that?” he demanded. “A little hope!” I answered. FOOTNOTES: [8] A kind of business steward. CHAPTER XIX I REVISIT THE HOLY CITY In June, 1519, even as Dr. Luther had been girding up his loins for his disputation with Eck, the Seven Prince Electors, after infinite intrigue and lying, bribe asking and bribe giving (from which vile proceedings only Frederick of Saxony held nobly aloof), chose Prince Charles of the Low Countries and Spain, as our German Emperor,--‘Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire,’ ‘Cæsar, Pius, Felix, semper Augustus’,--with I know not what other grandiloquent titles, which the heralds, who made proclamation, gave to him. So now we had a lad of nineteen to rule over us,--the heir of a great hereditary possession. Good things were said of his precosity and wit, but many a German shook his head over the choice. “There are a thousand things to be done, and only this boy to do them. Please God he will cut himself clear of his Flemish and Spanish advisers and know what the Fatherland craves. But, praise heaven, at least we have not Francis, the flashy Frenchman, to lord it in the Fatherland!”