"What you here!" exclaimed Rathsherr Herse.
"Yes," said Fritz quite abashed.
"Well then it's all over again with secrecy, for what three know, the whole world knows."
"I promise faithfully I won't tell, Herr Rathsherr," said Fritz. "And, Mamsell, I know a capital place. There's a plank loose in the garret where you hang your hams and sausages to smoke, and, if you make yourself small, you can squeeze through, and behind there by the chimney there's a little place where you can hide and no one would ever find you."
"You young scoundrel," said Mamsell Westphalen, forgetting all her sorrows and woes, "then it's you who are always stealing the sausages from up there; and, Herr Rathsherr, I have always suspected the innocent rats."
My uncle, having threatened Fritz Sahlmann with a sound thrashing, said it was now high time and they must fly, and it would be the very place. So they all set off up to the garret, and when Fritz Sahlmann had shown them the loose plank and the hiding-place, my uncle Herse said--
"Well, Mamsell, now sit down on the floor. There's no help for it. I will lock the door of the garret; and if you hear anyone coming, creep softly into the hole, and mind you don't sneeze or cough."
"You may well say that, Herr Rathsherr--in this smoke," she replied.
"Oh, we will soon manage that," said he, and opened the dormer window.
They were going away when she said, "Fritz, my lad, don't forsake me; and bring me word how things are going on."