old Tussmann, or the insufferable Baron Benjie, and then she
remembered the mysterious Goldsmith, and the strange, supernatural way
in which he had prevented the Baron from touching her. She felt quite
sure that he had been on Edmund's side then; wherefore a hope began to
dawn in her heart that it must be on him that she should rely for help
at this crisis of her affairs. Above all things she wished that she
only could just have a little talk with him then and there; and was
quite sure that she shouldn't be at all frightened, really, if he were
to appear to her suddenly, in some strange, spectral sort of manner.

So that she really was not in the least frightened when she saw that
what she had been thinking was the stove was really Leonhard the
Goldsmith, who came up to her and said, in a gentle, harmonious
voice:--

"My dear child, lay aside all grief and anxiety. Edmund Lehsen, whom,
at present at all events, you believe you love, is a special _protege_
of mine; and I am helping him with all the power at my command. Let me
further tell you that it was I who put the lottery idea into your
father's head; that I am going to provide and prepare the caskets, and,
of course, you see that no one but Edmund will find your portrait."

Albertine felt inclined to shout for joy. The Goldsmith continued:--

"I could have brought about the giving of your hand to Edmund in other
ways; but I particularly wish to make the two rivals, Tussmann and the
Baron, completely contented at the same time. So that that is going to
be done, and you and your father will be quite sure to have no more
trouble on their part."

Albertine poured forth the warmest expressions of gratitude. She almost
fell at his feet, she pressed his hand to her heart, she declared that,
notwithstanding all the magic tricks he had performed, nay, even after
the way he had come into her room, she wasn't in the least afraid of
him; and she concluded with the somewhat naive request that he would
tell her all about himself, and who he really was.

"My dear child," he answered, "it would not be by any means an easy
matter for me to tell you exactly who I am. Like many others, I know
much better whom I take other people for than what I really and truly
am myself. But I may tell you, my dear, that many think I am none other
than that Leonhard Turnhaeuser the Goldsmith, who was such a famous
character at the court of the Elector Johann Georg, in the year 1580,
and who di