"My wife and daughter beg, as I do also, that you will not consider them at a time like this. Go, gentlemen," cried the baron, with outstretched arms; "the honor of an old soldier is in your hands."
Both bowed low before the blind man, and left the room. "After all, there is honor in the man," said Fink, nodding as he went along. Then he opened the door and the officer rode up.
"The Baron Rothsattel thanks you for your proposal; but he is resolved to defend his house, and the property of those who have trusted to him, to the very utmost. We can not accept your offer."
"Take, then, the consequences," cried the officer, "and the responsibility of all that must ensue."
"I will take the responsibility," said Fink; "but I have still one request to make from you. Besides the wives and children of the country people, there are two ladies in the castle, the wife and daughter of the Baron Rothsattel; if an accident should enable you to occupy this house, I recommend these defenseless ones to the protection of your honor."
"I am a Pole!" cried the officer, proudly rising in his stirrups. Then taking off his hat, he galloped back to the farm-yard.
"He looks a bold fellow," said Fink, turning to the men who had gathered round him from the guard-room; "but, my friends, when one has the choice of trusting to an enemy's promises or to this little iron barrel, I always think it best to rely upon what we have in our hand."
He shook his rifle as he spoke.
"The Pole promises safe-conduct," continued Fink, "because he knows that in a couple of hours his band will be dispersed by our soldiers. We should be a good bite for him with our thirty guns. And then, if our cavalry came, and instead of us, who sent for them, found the house full of that rabble yonder, they would send a rattling curse after us, and we should be disgraced forever."
"I wonder whether he meant fair?" inquired one of the men, doubtingly.