"Very well, there are plenty of doctors here. There's one not ten steps away; there's another in Grasshopper Street; and still a third at the corner of Thieves' Lane." "But my father has no faith in any but his own physician, who lives in another district." "Go home and to sleep!" said the man. "That's all a lie; but you can't fool me. Good night!" He was about to close the door of his hut. "Let me pass," cried Omiti, in despair, "and I swear you shall be paid beyond your utmost hopes." "You have money, then?" said, the keeper, turning quickly back. Omiti recollected that she had a few kobangs in her sash, and said, "Yes." "Why didn't you say so in the beginning?" He took the monstrous key that hung from his belt and went to the gate. Omiti gave him a kobang. It was a large amount to the ill-paid man, who drank up his wages as fast as he earned them. "With such a reason in your hands, there was no need to put your father to death!" said he, throwing open the gate. "Which is the shortest way to reach the banks of the Yedogawa?" she asked. "Walk straight ahead. You'll come to another gate; it opens on the shore." "Thank you!" said she. And she moved rapidly away. The road was better; the snow had been shovelled away and piled in heaps. "How I am safe," thought the happy girl, heedless of the fatigue that weighed her down. She gained the second gate. But now she knew what she was to do to have it opened. The keeper was pacing up and down, stamping his feet, to keep warm. "I'll give you a kobang if you'll open the gate," she exclaimed. The man stretched out his hand and put the key in the lock. Omiti passed through; she was on the bank of the river. She had only to climb up to the castle now. The road was long, but unimpeded. She walked bravely forward, drawing her gown close about her, to ward off the cold. The guardians of the night passed on the other shore, striking their tambourines, to announce the last watch of the night. When the young girl reached the castle, a wan and pallid light was struggling to break through the clouds. The snow resumed its dazzling bluish whiteness; it seemed to radiate light rather than to absorb it from that gloomy sky, apparently covered with reddish smoke. The castle reared its imposing mass before the young girl's gaze. The lofty towers stood out against the heavens, the broad roofs of the princely pavilions were ranged in order; the cedars along the first terrace had collected on their evergreen branches heavy lumps of snow, fragments of which fell from time to time and slid from bough to bough. Omiti felt the tears come into her eyes when she saw the ruined walls and the filled-up moats. "My poor dear Prince!" she said. "You have given yourself up to your enemy; if the war were to begin again, you would be lost. At least you shall escape once more from the odious conspiracy contrived against you."