“Hard indeed!” quoth she in a low voice.  “But for a free man, and so proud a man as Herdegen, to be a slave to a misbelieving Heathen, far away from all he loves, and chidden and punished for every unduteous look; Oh, Margery! to think of that!” And her voice failed.

I spoke to her, and showed that we had much to make us thankful, inasmuch as we now at last knew that he we loved was yet alive.

Then was there silence in the chamber; but I minded me then of what Akusch had written, that he besought some wise and mighty gentleman to set forth from Nuremberg to overpower the foe, and now I racked my brain to think whom we might send to take my brothers’ cause in hand—­yet still in vain.  None could I think of who might conveniently quit home for so long, or who was indeed fit for such an enterprise.

Which of us twain first fell asleep I wist not; when I woke in the morning Ann had already quitted the chamber; and while Susan braided my hair, all I had been planning in the night grew plainer to me, and I went forth and down stairs full of a great purpose which made my heart beat the faster.  When I entered the ball, behold, I saw the same thing, albeit I was now awake, as I had seen yestermorn in my half-sleep.  Yet was it not Uhlwurm, but Kubbeling, to whom Ann was paying court.  As he stood facing her, she looked him trustfully in the eyes, and held his great hand in hers; nay, and when she saw me she did not let it go, but cried out in a clear and thankful voice:  “Then so it is, Father Seyfried; and if you do as I beseech you, all will come to a good end and you will remember so good a deed with great joy all your life long.”

“As to ‘great joy’ I know not,” replied he.  “For if I be not the veriest fool in all the land from Venice to Iceland, my name is not Kubbeling.  I scarce know myself!  Howbeit, let that pass:  I stand by my word, albeit the pains I shall endure in the winter journey.”

“The Saints will preserve you on so pious an errand,” Ann declared.  “And if they should nevertheless come upon you, dear Father, I will tend you as your own daughter would.  And now again your hand, and a thousand, thousand thanks.”

Whereupon Kubbeling, with a melancholy growl, and yet a smile on his face, held forth his hand, and Ann held it fast and cried to me:  “You are witness, Margery, that he has promised to do my will.  Oh, Margery, I could fly for gladness!”

And verily meseemed as though the wings had grown, and her eyes sparkled right joyfully and thankfully.  And I had discerned from her very first words whereunto she had beguiled Kubbeling; and verily to me it was a marvel, inasmuch as I myself had imagined the self-same thing in the watches of the night, and while my hair was doing:  namely, to beseech Kubbeling to be my fellow and keeper on a voyage to Egypt.  Who but he knew the way so well?  Howbeit, Ann had prevented me, and now, whereas I heard the sound of voices on the stair, I yet found time to cry to her:  “We go together, Ann; that is a settled matter!”