“Thou wilt not see him, Master Ran,” replied the sheriff of the town, coming forward from among the crowd, where he had hitherto stood concealed, “till I give my men leave to open his door. I have had my eye on yon fellow for many months, for ye all know that he has long been suspected of witchcraft and sorcery; but what no one knows is, that the Hartzman, before he left this place, gave me further and more telling proofs of Schürer’s evil doings, which he had noticed unawares. Only he prayed me not to denounce him—except he should try to fly from the town—until this day arrived. I have kept my word, but Schürer has been a prisoner in his smelting-hut since this noon; and if ye will, we can now go there, and judge of his doings for ourselves.”
No sooner said than done. The sheriff, Master Ran, and the whole company turned their steps to the little hut on the hill, followed, I dare swear, at a short distance, by the trembling Gretchen. As the bolt which the sheriff had had fastened across the door was withdrawn, a joyful exclamation greeted the startled officers of justice, and Schürer came towards them with a glowing face, holding in his hand a trough full of a blue powder of beautiful colour.
“Welcome, my masters!” he cried, without noticing their black looks. “Are ye come that I may prove to you the sooner how I have kept my word?”
“Not so fast, Master Schürer,” interrupted the sheriff; “keep thy welcome till thou seest how far it is due. We have come to charge thee with witchcraft and sorcery. What hast thou to say against that?”
Christopher’s face darkened, but he showed no dejection. “I say,” he answered, “that ye should prove before you condemn; and here now I have the proof to give. A few days past it might have gone harder with me, for I could not have convinced you of the sincerity of my aim; but within the last few hours, thank Heaven, the work of long months has been successful, and I can bring the ‘pot of gold’—or what is as good—that I promised to produce to-night, as the price of Mistress Gretchen’s hand.” His eyes sought those of some one in the crowd, and seemingly found what they sought, for he continued with a joyful smile: “See this powder; it is prepared, by an invention of my own, from that ore which you think worthless, and cast away out of the mines; and if I mistake not, it will be of great use, and bring work and wealth back amongst our people.”
He then showed them how the powder was made, and what its use was, and soon convinced even those who would most willingly have continued to suspect him, that he was free from the charge they had made against him. Master Ran, too, presently saw that the discovery of the beautiful blue powder, which the people at first called the “blue wonder,” but which was afterwards named smalt, would be as good as many a pot of gold to Christopher, and so he ended by giving him his daughter with a good grace, all the more that he saw well enough the young people would never suffer to be parted. The wedding feast was clouded only by the memory of the unhappy suitors who had fallen victims to their own folly and Ran’s greed.
Many people, and Gretchen amongst them, often wondered what had become of the Hartzman, and whether he had been punished by some dreadful accident for his plot against Schürer. But no answer was forthcoming to this question, for many years. Mistress Gretchen was already the buxom mother of many fair children, when one day a man, worn and old before his time, came toiling up the village street, and stopped before the ale-house. Master Ran, now quite an old fellow, was sitting at the door, and seeing the man’s gaze fixed upon his face, noticing, too, something familiar in his look, he inquired: “Dost thou know me, friend, or can I do somewhat for thee?”
“I see,” answered the traveller, “that the Hartzman is forgotten. I suspected as much, and suppose, indeed, that the game is played out, but I wanted to come and see for myself!”
“The Hartzman!” cried Ran. “Why, we all thought you lost, man, long ago, with the others. For know that they were lost, all save my son-in-law, Christopher, who has made Schneeberg rich. But tell us where thou hast been these many years, and why thou didst give up the prize that once so tempted thee—yea, tempted thee to do a dirty trick, too. But let bygones be bygones!”