“Goodness gracious! Yes, I know it, I——” Just here Rand put his head in at the door: “There’s another one coming, and the baker’s wife says——”
“Fool, I don’t want to know what that impertinent woman says.”
Rand retired. “That woman has a lot to say; she says too—goodness gracious! she says you are going to get married, Konrektor. But I forbid you. I’ll never set eyes on you again. I’d banish you from court.”
“I esteem your Highness as my liege lord,” said the Konrektor, quietly getting up, “but whether I marry or don’t marry ought to be all the same to you, and I wont brook interference from any man. If you want to banish me from court you can do it, that’s in your power; but I can also go of my own free will, that’s in my power. I have the honour of bidding you farewell.”
“Mercy on us! Do stay here; you’re the only comfort I have. Oh, goodness gracious!”
Here Rand put his head in at the door.
“Your Highness, this one is going to be pretty bad; the storm can’t come across the lake, and the baker’s wife says——”
“You hare-brained dolt, I don’t want to know what she says. Shut the door and bolt it on the outside, so that he can’t get out.”
“Well, your Highness,” said the Konrektor, taking off his sorcerer’s habit and donning his own honest coat, “you can hold me by force—that was a terrific clap!”
“Mercy on us!—yes, that it was. Do come in here again.”