The next day the wheel was mended, and the spinner sat down to spin. Feeling that while she was spinning he was dying, the Count ordered that her hands should be tied, and that they should not lose sight of her for one instant. But the guards fell asleep, the bonds loosed themselves, and the spinner spun on. Burchard had every nettle rooted up for three leagues round. Scarcely had they been torn from the soil when they sowed themselves afresh, and grew as you were looking at them. They sprung up even in the well-trodden floor of the cottage, and as fast as they were uprooted the distaff gathered to itself a supply of nettles, crushed, prepared, and ready for spinning. And every day Burchard grew worse, and watched his end approaching. VI Moved by pity for her husband, the Countess at last found out the cause of his illness, and entreated him to allow himself to be cured. But the Count in his pride refused more than ever to give his consent to the marriage. So the lady resolved to go without his knowledge to pray for mercy from the spinner, and in the name of Renelde’s dead mother she besought her to spin no more. Renelde gave her promise, but in the evening Guilbert arrived at the cottage. Seeing that the cloth was no farther advanced than it was the evening before, he inquired the reason. Renelde confessed that the Countess had prayed her not to let her husband die. ‘Will he consent to our marriage?’ ‘No.’ ‘Let him die then.’ ‘But what will the Countess say?’ ‘The Countess will understand that it is not your fault; the Count alone is guilty of his own death.’ ‘Let us wait a little. Perhaps his heart may be softened.’ So they waited for one month, for two, for six, for a year. The spinner spun no more. The Count had ceased to persecute her, but he still refused his consent to the marriage. Guilbert became impatient. The poor girl loved him with her whole soul, and she was more unhappy than she had been before, when Burchard was only tormenting her body. ‘Let us have done with it,’ said Guilbert. ‘Wait a little still,’ pleaded Renelde. But the young man grew weary. He came more rarely to Locquignol, and very soon he did not come at all. Renelde felt as if her heart would break, but she held firm. One day she met the Count. She clasped her hands as if in prayer, and cried: ‘My lord, have mercy!’ Burchard the Wolf turned away his head and passed on. She might have humbled his pride had she gone to her spinning-wheel again, but she did nothing of the sort. Not long after she learnt that Guilbert had left the country. He did not even come to say good-bye to her, but, all the same, she knew the day and hour of his departure, and hid herself on the road to see him once more. When she came in she put her silent wheel into a corner, and cried for three days and three nights. VII