So Ulenspiegel stood up and took in his hand the big pot of English pewter that held just four quarts.
“Mother,” he asked, “what shall I do?”
“Go,” said Katheline.
Soetkin did not like to say anything more, for she was not mistress of the house. So she told her son to go and do as Katheline had bidden him. Ulenspiegel ran to the tavern and brought back with him the four quarts of dobbel kuyt. And soon the kitchen reeked with the good smell of pancakes, and every one felt hungry, even the poor afflicted Katheline.
Ulenspiegel ate heartily, and drank heartily also, for Katheline had given him a full tankard, saying, with a malicious look, that it behoved him to drink more than the others seeing that he was the only male and the head of the house. Afterwards she asked him to give them a song.
But Ulenspiegel did not sing, and Nele was all tearful, seeing Soetkin so pale, and as it were all sunken into herself. Katheline alone of them all appeared to be happy.
When the meal was over Soetkin and Ulenspiegel went up into the loft to bed. Katheline and Nele stayed behind, for they slept together in the kitchen.
All was quiet until the second hour after midnight. Ulenspiegel had already been asleep for a long time because of all the beer he had been drinking. But Soetkin, as her custom was, lay on with eyes wide open, praying Our Lady to send her sleep, but with no avail.
All of a sudden she heard the cry of a sea-eagle, and from the kitchen came a like cry, in answer. Then, from far off in the country somewhere, other cries resounded, always as it seemed in answer to that cry in the kitchen just below.
Soetkin tried to think it was only the night-birds calling to one another, and endeavoured to distract her attention from those sounds. But presently she heard a neighing of horses and a noise as of iron sabots beating along the high road. Then it was that she opened the window of the loft and saw that in very fact there were a couple of horses saddled just outside the cottage, pawing the ground and nibbling the grass that grew by the side of the road. Thereafter she heard the voice of a woman crying out in fear, and a man’s voice threatening, followed by the sound of blows, more cries, a door shutting with a bang, and then steps running up the ladder in mortal fear: