Wolf hastened out and with hurrying fingers
opened the little package he had brought and gave her the costly fur
which was to serve as trimming for the velvet jacket, she again laughed
gleefully, and, ere Wolf was aware of it, she had thrown her arms around
his neck and kissed him on both cheeks.

He submitted as if dazed, and did not even regain his senses
sufficiently to profit by what she had granted him with such unexpected
liberality. Nor did she allow him to speak as she loosed her arms from
his neck, for, with a bewitching light in her large, blue eyes, fairly
overflowing with grateful tenderness, she cried:

"You dear, dear, kind little Wolf! To think that you should have
remembered me so generously! And how rich you must be! If I had become
so before you, I should have given myself a dress exactly like this.
Now it's mine, just as though it had dropped from the sky. Wine-coloured
Flanders velvet, with a border of dark-brown marten fur! I'll parade in
it like the Duchess of Bavaria or rich Frau Fugger. Holy Virgin! if that
isn't becoming to my golden hair! Doesn't it just suit me, you little
Wolf and great spendthrift? And when I wear it at the dance in the New
Scale or sing in it at the Convivium musicum, my Woller cousins and the
Thun girl will turn yellow with envy."

Wolf had only half listened to this outburst of delight, for he
had reserved until the last his best offering--a sky-blue turquoise
breastpin set with small diamonds. It brought him enthusiastic thanks,
and Barbara even allowed him to fasten the magnificent ornament with his
own fingers, which moved slowly and clumsily enough.

Then she hurried into her chamber to bring the hand-mirror, and when in
an instant she returned and, at her bidding, he held the shining glass
before her, she patted his cheeks with their thin, fair, pointed beard,
and called him her faithful little Wolf, her clear, stupid pedant and
Satan in person, who would fill her mind with vanity.

Finally, she laid the piece of velvet over the back of a chair, let it
fall down to the floor, and threw the bands of fur upon it. Every graver
word, every attempt to tell her what he expected from her, the girl
cut short with expressions of gratitude and pleasure until her father
returned from the suffering Ursel.

Then, radiant with joy, she showed the old man her new treasures, and
the father's admiration and expressions of gratitude were not far behind
the daughter's.

It seem