Soetkin went to bed, Ulenspiegel likewise, and heard her weeping beneath the coverlets.
Outside, in the silence of night, the wind made the trees by the canal complain with a sound as of the sea, and, harbinger of autumn, flung dust in whirlwinds against the cottage windows.
Ulenspiegel saw as it might be a man coming and going; he heard as it might be a sound of feet in the kitchen. Looking, he saw no man; hearkening, he heard nothing now but the wind soughing in the chimney and Soetkin weeping under her bedclothes.
Then he heard steps again, and behind him, at his head, a sigh.... “Who is there?” he said.
None answered, but three knocks were given on the table. Ulenspiegel grew afraid, and trembling: “Who is there?” he said again. He received no answer but three knocks on the table and he felt two arms clasp and strain him, and a body lean upon his face, a body whose skin was wrinkled and that had a great hole in its breast and a smell of burning:
“Father,” said Ulenspiegel, “is it thy poor body that weighs thus upon me?”
He got no answer, and although the shade was beside him, he heard a cry without: “Thyl! Thyl!” Suddenly Soetkin rose and came to Ulenspiegel’s bed, “Dost thou hear naught?” said she.
“Aye,” said he, “the father calling on me.”
“I,” said Soetkin, “I felt a cold body beside me in my bed; and the mattresses moved, and the curtains were shaken and I heard a voice saying: Soetkin; a voice low as a breath, and a step light as the sound of a gnat’s wings.” Then speaking to Claes’s spirit:—“Husband,” she said, “if thou desirest aught in heaven where God keeps thee in his glory, thou must tell us what it is, that we may carry out thy will.”
Suddenly a blast blew the door open impetuously, filling the chamber with dust, and Ulenspiegel and Soetkin heard the far-off croakings of ravens.