Ebbo trusted that his kinsman of Wildschloss was safe gone with the Court, and his temper smoothed and his spirits rose in proportion while preparations for a return to Adlerstein were being completed—preparations by which the burgher lady might hope to render the castle far more habitable, not to say baronial, than it had ever been.
The lady herself felt thankful that her stay at Ulm had turned out well beyond all anticipations in the excellent understanding between her uncle and her sons, and still more in Ebbo’s full submission and personal loyalty towards the imperial family. The die was cast, and the first step had been taken towards rendering the Adlerstein family the peaceful, honourable nobles she had always longed to see them.
She was one afternoon assisting her aunt in some of the duties of her wirthschaft, when Master Gottfried entered the apartment with an air of such extreme complacency that both turned round amazed; the one exclaiming, “Surely funds have come in for finishing the spire!” the other, “Have they appointed thee Provost for next year, house-father?”
“Neither the one nor the other,” was the reply. “But heard you not the horse’s feet? Here has the Lord of Adlerstein Wildschloss been with me in full state, to make formal proposals for the hand of our child, Christina.”
“For Christina!” cried Hausfrau Johanna with delight; “truly that is well. Truly our maiden has done honour to her breeding. A second nobleman demanding her—and one who should be able richly to endow her!”
“And who will do so,” said Master Gottfried. “For morning gift he promises the farms and lands of Grünau—rich both in forest and corn glebe. Likewise, her dower shall be upon Wildschloss—where the soil is of the richest pasture, and there are no less than three mills, whence the lord obtains large rights of multure. Moreover, the Castle was added to and furnished on his marriage with the late baroness, and might serve a Kurfürst; and though the jewels of Freiherrinn Valeska must be inherited by her daughter, yet there are many of higher price which have descended from his own ancestresses, and which will all be hers.”
“And what a wedding we will have!” exclaimed Johanna; “it shall be truly baronial. I will take my hood and go at once to neighbour Sophie Lemsberg, who was wife to the Markgraf’s Under Keller-Meister. She will tell me point device the ceremonies befitting the espousals of a baron’s widow.”
Poor Christina had sat all this time with drooping head and clasped hands, a tear stealing down as the formal terms of the treaty sent her spirit back to the urgent, pleading, imperious voice that had said, “Now, little one, thou wilt not shut me out;” and as she glanced at the ring that had lain on that broad palm, she felt as if her sixteen cheerful years had been an injury to her husband in his nameless bloody grave. But protection was so needful in those rude ages, and second marriages so frequent, that reluctance was counted as weakness. She knew her uncle and aunt would never believe that aught but compulsion had bound her to the rude outlaw, and her habit of submission was so strong that, only when her aunt was actually rising to go and consult her gossip, she found breath to falter,
“Hold, dear aunt—my sons—”
“Nay, child, it is the best thing thou couldst do for them. Wonders hast thou wrought, yet are they too old to be without fatherly authority. I speak not of Friedel; the lad is gentle and pious, though spirited, but for the baron. The very eye and temper of my poor brother Hugh—thy father, Stine—are alive again in him. Yea, I love the lad the better for it, while I fear. He minds me precisely of Hugh ere he was ’prenticed to the weapon-smith, and all became bitterness.”