as tall as my father! It is beautiful to see him strip
his doublet and lay to. They say there is not a woodman like him in
all our land."

Helene looked at my father, whose arms were folded in his great cloak.

"But you have fine strong arms too," she said. "You look as if you could
cut things. Did my father ever see you cut down tall trees?"

"Yes," said Gottfried Gottfried, slowly, "once!"

"And did he say that you cut well?" the little maid went on, with a
strange, wilful persistence in her idea.

"He neither said that I did well nor yet that I did ill," replied
Gottfried Gottfried.

"Ah!" said Helene, "that was just like the Prince. He was afraid of
flattering you and making you unfit for your work. But if he said
nothing, depend upon it he was pleased."

"Thank you, Princess," said my father. "I think he was well enough
pleased."

Just then there came a noise that I knew--a sound which chilled every
bone in my body.

It was the clear ring of a steady footstep upon the pavement without. It
came heavily and slowly across the yard. The outer hasp of our door
clicked. The door opened, and the footstep began to ascend the stair.

There was but one man in the world who dared make so free with the
Red Tower and its occupant. Our visitor was without doubt the Duke
Casimir himself.

For the first time I saw my father manifestly disconcerted. The little
maid's life might be worth no more than a torn ballad if Duke Casimir
happened to be in evil humor or had repented him of his mercy of the
past night. I saw the Red Axe look aimlessly about for a hiding-place.
There was a niche round which certain cloaks and coverlets were hung.

"Come in here," he said, abruptly.

"Why should I hide, whoever comes?" asked the Little Playmate,
indignantly.

"It is the Duke Casimir," whispered my father, hurriedly, stirred as I
had never seen him. "Come hither quickly!"

But the little maid struck an attitude, and tapped the floor with her
foot.

"I will not," she said. "What is the Duke Casimir to me that am a
Princess? If he is good, I will give him my hand to kiss!"

But at this point I rushed from the ladder-head, and, taking her in my
arms, I sped up the turret stairs with her out upon the leads, my hand
over her mouth all the time.

And as I ran I could hear the Duke trampling upward not twenty steps in
the rear. I opened the trap-door and went out into the clear morning
sunshine. And only the turn of the stair p