“Oh! gentle sir!” began the boldest, “you make us blush. Surely you do not mean your fine words.” “Of a truth I do, by St. Maria. There is no countess or duchess down below with a whiter neck and a slimmer waist than yours, my pretty.” And here with an abandon that did me credit as an actor, I put my sinful hand around the very body of one of the girls--to wit, Trude, with that mingling of force and cozening which will make the average country hussy pledge her soul. “Oh! sir, oh! sir,” began she, turning very red, “I am a poor but honest maid. My father is an honest man. I do not know you--” “Come, come, my lass,” I enjoined, “I mean not the least mischief, just that you walk with me a few turns in the gallery. If my Lady Abbess’s maids wish to sit up late to watch his Majesty’s ball, they surely must pay the dance-groschen afterward.” The other women cast envious glances at Trude. She hung back an instant, modestly fighting against the delicious flattery of being favored by even a tipsy gentleman in such fine clothes. I knew she dared not make outcry. Her mistress would never forgive such a breach of decorum by her servants as watching out the imperial ball, when they should have been in bed. In a moment I had her around the corner of the gallery where it was dark, and with no one listening in case she gave a little scream. Then my hand around her waist relaxed. I spoke to her in the broad Harzland brogue. When I told her who I was, she all but fainted; but speedily, being indeed a girl of good fundamentals, recovered herself, and listened to me. I told her rapidly but completely the story of how I came to be in the castle, and explained at least a part of my former relations to the Forlis, and my present predicament. Only the proffer made me by the Emperor I kept hid. That was a matter I scarcely dared to open even to my own soul. When I had finished this I began to press her to use every means to communicate with Graf Moritz and Adolf and her own father as to my captivity, and to urge them to set some manner of watch to discover whither I might be carried in custody. “For though I seem so free to-night,” I concluded, “I fear much I shall not be so free to-morrow, but again in close custody.” To my entreaties, however, Trude shook her head. She said the abbess had withdrawn Ilsa from Worms because her mistress had become thoroughly suspicious lest in some occult way her niece was giving room to thoughts and deeds unlawful; and that Trude herself was suffering from this same treatment. She had not been permitted to leave the castle since entering, and as for Ilsa, her aunt had confined her in a narrow chamber on bread and water. “No one in the castle talks anything but Italian or Spanish gibberish,” the poor girl asserted. “I have no friends. The sight of so many strangers scares me. I know not what to do. Ach! _liebe Gott_, I wish we were all safely back in the Harzland!” A sentiment wherein I am sure I heartily joined.