But as for me, my blood had nigh boiled over. That night, after the Gräfin and her brother had retired, I went down into the great common room of the inn, and there in a roaring company, cans clinking and foul jests going about full merrily, was his Reverence the Pope’s Commissioner. I strode straight into the herd of wandering friars, discharged lanz-knechts, guzzling burghers, and up to the armchair where the Herr Preacher sat, with a fat, sly-eyed bar wench hanging on his elbow. The sight of a man in the dress of a gentleman, and with a silver scabbard, made everybody put down his mug, and look sharply as I accosted the Commissioner. “Magister Johannes Tetzel,” spoke I clearly in Latin, standing before him, “I would speak with you.” “Welcome, welcome to your Lordship,” the fellow slipped his flagon back to the woman and turned on me an eye as worldly wise as a rat’s; “your nobility would purchase one of my matchless and infallible soul medicaments?” “Not for all the world. Now hear me, Herr Papal Commissioner. I have perforce to-day listened to your sermon, and very vile it was. I am a layman, but I know as much theology as full many gorging clerks; and I say to your face, you are befooling these honest folk out of their poor money as foully as did ever a Jew with his usury.” The reverend domine flashed out of his seat like a bursting petard. His face was red as a beet. “A million fiends! What have we here--a Turkish infidel? Am I not the lawful Apostolic Commissioner and Inquisitor into Heretical Pravity? Do you want utter anathema and the major excommunication?” “Pish,” I responded, deliberately banging my hilt upon the table, “I have lived in Rome. I’m not a silly girl to be scared by big words and hell fire. I say to you, you have exceeded your commission. Debatable as are all the Pope’s indulgences, you have preached them in a manner your betters never authorized.” “Now, by St. Dominic,” sneered the preacher, recovering a little of his poise, “who are you, my brave ritter, to swagger in here, and talk like a bishop? If you _have_ been in Rome, you will remember the saying there current, ‘God desireth not the death of any sinner, but that he should _pay_ and live’; and as for my instructions, I have followed them so excellently well that my chest is exceeding heavy, and that is all the Archbishop of Mainz or the Pope are likely to ask about.” “Or the banking house of the Fuggers,” I flung back, casting an eye upon the spruce agent who sat by his wine in a corner. “Verily, Magister Tetzel, I hear that at your north country festivals there is a prize to the champion telling the greatest lie. By all the devils in hell I swear you are full victor!”