So I raved within me, half because I believed it, and half because she seemed so comfortable up there, with her feet on a stool and a cool jug of curds at her elbow, while I sweated and labored in the sun.

Very decidedly it must be Texel; devil fly up with him and scratch him among the gargoyles of the minster!

The fan wagged on.  It looked distractingly cool within.  But then my father—­filial obedience was very distinctly a duty, and, also, Gottfried Gottfried, though kind, was a man not to be disobeyed—­even at nineteen, and after defying the White Wolf.

It was, as I have said, about three by the sundial on the wall, the arch of which cast a shadow like jet on the scale, that my father came out through the narrow door from the Judgment Hall, opening it with his own key.  For he had the right of entrance and outgoing of every door in the palace, not even excepting the bedchamber of Duke Casimir.

“Hugo,” he said, “come hither, lad.  I did not mean to keep you so long at work in the sun.  You must have filled all the cisterns in the place by this time!”

I thanked him sincerely, but did not pursue the subject.  For, indeed, I had not worked quite so hard as in his haste my father had supposed from my appearance.

“Go within,” he said; “don quickly your saint’s-day dress, and betake yourself down to the house of Master Gerard von Sturm, the city chamberlain, and tell him all that he asks of you—­readily and truly.”

“But, father,” said I, “suppose he asks of me that which might condemn one who has trusted me, what am I to say?”

“Tut, boy,” said my father, impatiently, “you mean young Michael Texel.  Fear not for him.  He was the first to inform.  He was at Master von Sturm’s by eight this morning, elbowing half a dozen others, all burning and shining lights of the famous Society of the White Wolf.  You are the hero of the day down there, it seems.”

“And lo! here I am flouted by a stripling girl, and set to carry water by the hour in the broiling sun!” I said within myself.  I possessed, however, though without doubt a manifest hero, far too much of the unheroic quality of discretion to say this aloud to my father.

“I thank you, sir,” I said, respectfully.  “I will go at once and put on my finest coat and my shoes of silk.”

My father smiled.

“You need not be particular as to the silk shoes.  ’Tis to see Master von Sturm, not to court pretty Mistress Ysolinde, that I asked you to visit the lawyer’s house by the Weiss Thor.”

But I was not sorry to be able to proclaim my destination as loud as I dared without causing suspicion.

“Hanne,” I cried down the turret stairs, “I pray you bring me the silken shoes with the ribbon bows of silk.  I am going down to Master von Sturm’s house; also my gold chain and bonnet of blue velvet with the golden feather in it which I won at the last arrow-shooting.”