hed it to the wrong belt, then, for you believed him. He should
have tied it to mine. What reason does he give for presenting it to
you?"

"Ah, now you touch a point of anxiety in my own mind. I have seen
nothing of Roland this morning. I surmised that he had arisen before me,
and expected to meet him somewhere down the stream, but have not done
so."

"He may have gone farther afield. As you found the bag, he of course,
missed it, and probably continued his search."

"I doubt that, because I came upon a point of view reaching to the Rhine
and the hills beyond. I could trace the stream for a considerable
distance, and watched it for a long time, but there appeared to be
nothing alive in the forest."

"You don't suppose he has gone back to Frankfort, do you?"

"I am at loss what to think."

"If he has abandoned this gang of malcontents, I should be the last to
blame him. The way these pigs acted yesterday was disgraceful, ending up
their day with rank mutiny and threats of violence. By the iron Cross,
Greusel, he has forsaken this misbegotten lot, and it serves them
perfectly right, prating about comradeship and carrying themselves like
cut-throats. This is Roland's method of returning our money, for I
suppose that bag contains your thirty thalers and my twenty-five."

"Yes, and his own sixty as well. Poor disappointed devil, generous to
the last. It was he who obtained all the money at the beginning, then
these drunken swine spend it on wine, and prove so generous and brave
that eighteen of them muster courage enough to face one man, and he the
man who had bestowed the gold upon them."

"Greusel, the whole situation fills me with disgust. I propose we leave
the lot sleeping there, go to Wiesbaden for breakfast, and then trudge
back to Frankfort. It would serve the brutes right."

"No," said Greusel quietly; "I shall carry out Roland's instructions."

"I thought you hadn't seen him this morning?"

"Not a trace of him. You heard his orders at Breckenheim."

"I don't remember. What were they?"

"That if anything happened to him, I was to drive the herd to
Assmannshausen. I quite agree with you, Ebearhard, that he is justified
in deserting this menagerie, but, on the other hand, you and I have
stood faithfully by him, and it doesn't seem to me right that he should
leave us without a word. I don't believe he has done so, and I expect
any moment to see him return."

"You're wrong, Greusel. He's gone. That purs