“And you are the little lady of Adlerstein Wildschloss?”
“Yes,” again she answered; and then, gathering courage—“You are a holy pilgrim! Come up to the castle for supper and rest.” And then, springing past him, she flew up to the knight, crying, “Herr Freiherr, here is a holy pilgrim, weary and hungry. Let us take him home to the mother.”
“Did he take thee for a wild elf?” said the young man, with an elder-brotherly endeavour to right the little cap that had slidden under the chin, and to push back the unmanageable wealth of hair under it, ere he rose; and he came forward and spoke with kind courtesy, as he observed the wanderer’s worn air and feeble step. “Dost need a night’s lodging, holy palmer? My mother will make thee welcome, if thou canst climb as high as the castle yonder.”
The pilgrim made an obeisance, but, instead of answering, demanded hastily, “See I yonder the bearing of Schlangenwald?”
“Even so. Schloss Schlangenwald is about a league further on, and thou wilt find a kind reception there, if thither thou art bent.”
“Is that Graff Wolfgang’s tomb?” still eagerly pursued the pilgrim; and receiving a sign in the affirmative, “What was his end?”
“He fell in a skirmish.”
“By whose hand?”
“By mine.”
“Ha!” and the pilgrim surveyed him with undisguised astonishment; then, without another word, took up his staff and limped out of the building, but not on the road to Schlangenwald. It was nearly a quarter of an hour afterwards that he was overtaken by the young knight and the little lady on their horses, just where the new road to the castle parted from the old way by the Eagle’s Ladder. The knight reined up as he saw the poor man’s slow, painful steps, and said, “So thou art not bound for Schlangenwald?”