AXEL’S wife
  Kuno, come away!

[The children cling to him.  He smiles down triumphantly.

Piper Oho, Oho!  Look you?—­You preach—­I pipe! [Reenter the men, with Kurt and Jacobus, from the Rathaus, murmuring dubiously. [The piper sets down Jan and stands forth, smiling.

Jacobus
[smoothly]
H’m!  My good man, we have faithfully debated
Whether your vision of so great a sum
Might be fulfilled,—­as by some miracle. 
But no.  The moneys we administer
Will not allow it; nor the common weal. 
Therefore, for your late service, here you have
Full fifteen guilders,
[Holding forth a purse]
  and a pretty sum
Indeed, for piping!

Kurt
[ominously]
Take them!

Jacobus
  Either that,
Or, to speak truly, nothing!
[The piper is motionless]
Come, come.  Nay, count them, if you will.

Kurt
  Time goes!

Piper
Ay.  And your oath?

Kurt
No more; Enough.

[There is a sound of organ music from the Minster.]

Veronika
[beseechingly]
  Ah, Kurt!

Kurt
[savagely to the crowd]
What do ye, mewling of this fellow’s rights? 
He hath none!—­Wit ye well, he is a stroller,
A wastrel, and the shadow of a man! 
Ye waste the day and dally with the law. 
Such have no rights; not in their life nor body! 
We are in no wise bound.  Nothing is his. 
He may not carry arms; nor have redress
For any harm that men should put on him,
Saving to strike a shadow on the wall! 
He is a Nothing, by the statute-book;
And, by the book, so let him live or die,
Like to a masterless dog!

[The piper stands motionless with head up-raised, not looking at Kurt.  The people, half-cowed, half-doubting, murmur and draw back.  Lights appear in the Minster; the music continues.  Kurt and Jacobus lead in the people.  Jacobus picks up the money-purse and takes it with him.

Voices [laughing, drunkenly] One thousand guilders to a ‘masterless dog’! [Others laugh too, pass by, with pity and derision for the piper, and echoes of ‘masterless dog!’ Exeunt women and men to the Minster.  Only the children are left, dancing round the motionless figure of the piper.

Children
Oh, pipe again!  Oh, pipe and make us dance! 
Oh, pipe and make us run away from school! 
Oh, pipe and make believe we are the mice!

[He looks down at them.  He looks up at the houses.  Then he signs to them, with his finger on his lips; and begins, very softly, to pipe the Kinder-spell.  The old Claus and Ursula in the windows seem to doze.

The children stop first, and look at him, fascinated; then they laugh, drowsily, and creep closer,—­Jan always near.  They crowd around him.  He pipes louder, moving backwards, slowly, with magical gestures, towards the little by-streets and the closed doors.  The doors open, everywhere.