"I would like to make you some little present, but monseigneur never lets me have any money. He keeps all his money under lock and key in his coffers, and for only _morgen-gab_, the morning present that it is customary in our country for the husband to make to his wife, the count has given me the robes and jewels of his fourth wife, Wisigarde. Every day he demands of me that I show them to him, and he counts them. I have nothing to offer you, Morise, nothing but my friendship, if you promise me not to irritate monseigneur against me." "My heart would have to be very wicked, if I were to anger monseigneur against you." "Ah, Morise! How I would like to be in your place!" "You, a count's wife--you would prefer to be a slave! Impossible!" "He will not kill you." "Bah! He would as soon kill me as any one else, if the fancy took him--but you, madam, have in the meantime, beautiful dresses, rich jewels, slaves to serve you--and besides, you are free." "I do not step out of the burg." "Because you do not wish to. Wisigarde rode on horseback and hunted. You should have seen her on her black palfrey, with her purple robe, and her falcon on her finger! At any rate, though she be dead, she never wasted time grieving--while you, madam, do nothing else than work at your distaff, or gaze at the sky from your window, or weep--what a life! What a sad existence!" "Alas, it is because I am always thinking of my own country, of my parents, so far away--so far away from this country of Gaul, where I am an utter stranger." "Wisigarde did not trouble herself about such matters--she drank deeply, and ate almost as much as the count." "He always told me and my father that she died of an accident. And so you assure me, Morise, that it is there--on that spot--that he killed her?" "Yes, madam, he threw her down with a kick--she fell near that beam--and then--" "What ails you, Morise--why do you tremble?" "Madam, madam, do you not hear?" "What? Everything is quiet." "There is someone walking in seigneur the count's room--I hear the seats pushed about." "Oh, it is he--it is my husband!" "Yes, madam, it is his step." "Oh, I am afraid--remain near me!" It was Neroweg. His latest libations had thrown him into a state of almost complete intoxication. He stepped into his wife's apartment with a drunken man's unsteady foot. At the sight of their master, all the slaves rose timidly. As to Godegisele, she was in such a tremor that she was hardly able to rise from her stool. The count stopped for a moment at the threshold, leaned one hand against the door-case, and, with his body swaying backward and forward, let his eyes travel over the scared slaves with a besotted and semi-libidinous look. After repeated hiccoughs he called out to his wife's confidant: "Morise--come--come, confounded wench!" And looking at Godegisele he added: "You look pale--you seem troubled--my dove. Why so pale?"