A spectre stood in the hall. His eyes shot forth sparks of fire; his arms spread themselves out like an eagle's wings; his head toucht the ceiling: Pietro lay whining and howling at his feet. "It was I," so the demon spake on, "who furthered thy paltry tricks; who deluded the people; who made thee sin and thrive in thy sins. Thou troddest me under foot; I was thy scorn; thy high-minded wisdom triumpht over my silliness. Now I am thy master. Now thou shalt follow me as my bondslave into my kingdom.... Depart hence, ye poor wretches!" he cried to the youths: "what more we have still to settle, it befits not you to behold!" and a tremendous clap of thunder shook the house to the bottom. Dazzled, horrour-struck, Antonio and Alfonso rusht out; their knees tottered; their teeth chattered. Without knowing how, they found themselves again in the street; they fled into a neighbouring church; for a howling whirlwind now arose, with thunder and lightning, and the house, when they lookt behind them, was burning and had fallen in ruins. Two dark shadows hovered over the flame, fighting, as it seemed, and twining round each other, and wrestling and dashing each other to and fro: yells of despair and peals of scornful laughter resounded alternately between the pauses of the loudly raving storm. * * * * * It was a long time before Antonio could collect calmness enough to go and seek for the house of the old woman according to the directions he had received. He found her drest out; and she cried to him merrily: "What! Florentine! are you too come to see me again at last?" "Where is your daughter?" askt Antonio, trembling with anxiety. "If you wish to have her now," replied the old woman, "I won't keep her from you. But you must pay honestly for her, you or the Podesta of Padua, if he still lives; for she is his child, whom I stole from him long since, because the Marconis vouchsafed me a round sum of money for doing so." "If you can prove it," said the youth, "you shall have whatever you ask." "Proofs, as many as you please," cried the beldam: "trinkets with arms on them, clothes she had on at the time, a mole on her right shoulder, which of course her mother must know best. But you shall also have letters from the Marconis, writings which I carried off with her from Padua in my hurry, everything ... only money must be forthcoming."