XXXVIII
The news spread quickly through the neighbourhood that a man had been taken prisoner on a charge of heresy, and that the inquisitor Titelman, Dean of Renaix, surnamed the Inquisitor without Pity, had been appointed judge. Now at this time Ulenspiegel was living at Koolkerke, in the intimate favour of a farmer’s widow, a sweet and gentle person who refused him nothing of what was hers to give. He was very happy there, petted and made much of, until one day a treacherous rival, an alderman of the village, lay in wait for him early in the morning when he was coming out of the tavern, and would have beaten him with a wooden club. But Ulenspiegel, thinking to cool his rival’s anger, threw him into a duck-pond that was full of water, and the alderman scrambled out as best he could, green as a toad and dripping like a sponge.
As a result of this mighty deed Ulenspiegel found it convenient to depart from Koolkerke, and off he went to Damme as fast as his legs would carry him, fearing the vengeance of the alderman.
The night fell cold, and Ulenspiegel ran quickly. For he was longing to be home again, and already he saw in imagination Nele sewing by the fire, Soetkin getting ready the supper, Claes binding up his sticks, and Schnouffius gnawing at a bone.
A tramping pedlar met him on the road and asked him whither he was off to so fast and at that time of night.
“To my home in Damme,” Ulenspiegel told him.
The tramp said:
“That town is no longer safe. They are arresting the Reformers there.” And he passed on.
Presently Ulenspiegel arrived at the inn of the Roode Schildt and went in for a glass of dobbel kuyt. The innkeeper said to him:
“Are you not the son of Claes?”