I looked straight at him, but he was not even smiling!

“Yes, Fritz, you are just a messenger of good; the last two years the lord had another attack the next day after the first, then a third and a fourth.  You have put an end to that.  What can be clearer?”

“Well, to me it is not so very clear; on the contrary, it is very obscure.”

“We are never too old to learn,” the good man went on.  “Fritz, there are messengers of evil and there are messengers of good.  Now that rascal Knapwurst, he is a sure messenger of ill.  If ever I meet him as I am going out hunting I am sure of some misadventure; my gun misses fire, or I sprain my ankle, or a dog gets ripped up!—­all sorts of mischief come.  So, being quite aware of this, I always try and set off at early daybreak, before that author of mischief, who sleeps like a dormouse, has opened his eyes; or else I slip out by a back way by the postern gate.  Don’t you see?”

“I understand you very well, but your ideas seem to me very strange, Gideon.”

“You, Fritz,” he went on, without noticing my interruption, “you are a most excellent lad; Heaven has covered your head with innumerable blessings; just one glance at your jolly countenance, your frank, clear eyes, your good-natured smile, is enough to make any one happy.  You positively bring good luck with you.  I have always said so, and now would you like to have a proof?”

“Yes, indeed I should.  It would be worth while to know how much there is in me without my having any knowledge of it.”

“Well,” said he, grasping my wrist, “look down there!”

He pointed to a hillock at a couple of gunshots from the castle.

“Do you see there a rock half-buried in the snow, with a ragged bush by its side?”

“Quite well.”

“Do you see anything near?”

“No.”

“Well, there is a reason for that.  You have driven away the Black Plague!  Every year at the second attack there she was holding her feet between her hands.  By night she lighted a fire; she warmed herself and boiled roots.  She bore a curse with her.  This morning the very first thing which I did was to get up here.  I climbed up the beacon tower; I looked well all round; the old hag was nowhere to be seen.  I shaded my eyes with my hand.  I looked up and down, right and left, and everywhere; not a sign of the creature anywhere.  She had scented you evidently.”

And the good fellow, in a fit of enthusiasm, shook me warmly by the hand, crying with unchecked emotion—­

“Ah, Fritz, how glad I am that I brought you here!  The witch will be sold, eh?”

Well, I confess I felt a little ashamed that I had been all my life such a very well-deserving young man without knowing anything of the circumstance myself.

“So, Sperver,” I said, “the count has spent a good night?”

“A very good one.”

“Then I am very well pleased.  Let us go down.”