“Put out the fire! My head is burning!”
And the smell of the vinegar made Lamme feel hungry. But Ulenspiegel stood still where he was, gazing at Nele and smiling for love of her despite his great sorrow.
And Nele, without a word of greeting, flung her arms round his neck. And she also seemed like one bereft of sense. For she cried and laughed, and blushing as she was with her great and sweet happiness, she could only say: “Tyl! Tyl!”
Ulenspiegel, happy now in his turn, gazed into her eyes. Then she let go of him and stepped back a pace or two, gazed at him joyfully in her turn, and then threw herself on him again, clasping her arms round his neck, and so many times and again. And he suffered her gladly, powerless to tear himself away from her, till at last she fell into a chair, tired out and like one bereft of her senses, and she said without shame:
“Tyl! Tyl, my beloved! Here you are come back to me again!”
Lamme meanwhile was standing at the door; but when Nele had recovered herself a little, she pointed to him, saying:
“Where have I seen this fat man?”
“He is my friend,” Ulenspiegel told her. “He goes seeking his wife in my company.”
“I know you,” said Nele to Lamme. “You used to live in the rue Héron. You are seeking for your wife? Well, I have seen her. She is living at Bruges in all piety and devotion, and when I asked her why she had left her husband so unkindly, she answered that it was by the Holy Will of God and at the command of Holy Penance, and that she could never live with her husband again.”
At these words Lamme was sad, but his eyes wandered to the beans and vinegar. And outside the larks sang as they flew upwards into the sky, and all Nature swooned away under the caress of her Lord the Sun. And Katheline kept stirring with her spoon that pot of beans and sauce.