here among the peasants until old Jochem sends
me news of Schrimbs or Peppel. To be sure, in the course of my
eighty-mile journey I have cooled down a little, for it makes
considerable difference when two weeks intervene between a project and
its execution. Furthermore the question now is: What sort of revenge
shall I take on him? But all that will take care of itself later on.

Mentor, you shall soon hear more, I hope, from your Not-Telemachus.

CHAPTER VII

HOW THE HUNTER LIVES AT THE OBERHOF

Several days passed at the Oberhof in the usual quiet, monotonous way.
Still no word came from old Jochem, regarding either himself or the
escaped adventurer; and a mild anxiety gradually began, after a while,
to steal over his young master. For nowadays time is so regulated and so
enmeshes us that nobody, no matter how free and independent he may be,
can long endure an existence which does not offer him some occupation
or social relation to fall back on.

As much as he could, to be sure, the Hunter associated with the Justice,
and the man's originality continued to attract him just as strongly as
it had done on the first day of their acquaintance. But the old man was
occupied the greater part of the time with matters pertaining to his
household, and then he had, too, a great many things to discuss with
outsiders, since every day people dropped in at the farm to solicit his
help or advice. On these occasions the Hunter noticed that the Justice,
in the truest sense of the word, never did anything gratis. For
neighbors, relatives, and friends he was ready to do anything, but they
had always to do something for him in return, even were it only an
errand in a neighboring peasant community, or some other small service
of this kind.

Every day something was fired at, but regularly missed; so that the old
man, who invariably hit his mark, no matter what he aimed at, began to
look with astonishment upon these futile efforts. It was a fortunate
thing for our Hunter that the nearest estate-owner happened at that time
to be away on a trip with his family and servants, otherwise the
professional gunners up on the "Open Tribunal" would probably have
caught him sooner or later.

At noon on the following day the Hunter heard a noise under his window;
he looked out and saw that a number of men were standing in front of the
house. Just then the Justice, dressed in his Sunday clothes, stepped out
of the door, and at the same time a t