m you have to deal with, as it
has likewise been enough to show me what you truly are! Whereas I trusted
to have found a faithful and wise brain, what have I seen? Loveless and
malignant privity, miserable folly, and such schemes as might have been
dreamed of in a mad-house!"

"But, uncle, only hearken," I tried to say, and forthwith the idea fell
into my mind, which I afterwards found to be a true one, that either
Henneleinlein, had yestereve betrayed to him or to her gossip his
housekeeper, all she had heard at the Forest Lodge. He would not suffer
me to speak to the end, but went on to chide and complain, and broke in
again and again, even when at last I found words and made it plain to him
that we had kept our purpose privy from him to no end but to save him
from grieving so long as we might; and albeit he might be wroth with us,
yet he must grant that heretofore we had ever been modest and seemly
maidens; but now, when it was a matter of life and freedom for those who
were nearest and dearest to our hearts. . . .

Here he broke in with scornful laughter, and cried out that he, for his
part, might not indeed hope to be numbered among those chosen few. He had
ever known full well that when we did him any Samaritan service it had
been to no end save to draw from his purse the money to ransom my
brothers and Ann's lover. Every kind word had been pure lies and
falseness; yea, and worse than either of us were that crafty witch out in
the forest, and the old scarecrow who made boast of having been as a
mother to me. Thus far had I suffered his railing in patience, but now it
was too much for the hot blood of the Schoppers; I could refrain myself
no longer, and broke out in great wrath and reproaches for so vile an
accusation. If it were not that his age and infirmities claimed our
compassion, I would, said I, after such evil treatment, desire of Ann
that she should never more cross the threshold of a man who could so
cruelly defame us, and those two good women to whom we owed so much.

I spoke right loudly, beside myself with rage, and my face aglow; nor was
it till I marked that my uncle was staring at me as at some marvel that I
recovered myself, and on a sudden held my peace, inasmuch as the thought
flashed through my brain that I was denying my brother even as Peter
denied the Lord, albeit not indeed through any fear of man, but by giving
way to my angered pride. Howbeit I had not long ceased when the stern old
man