“I thought at first that he had invented the whole story.  But in that case he would hardly have agreed to my plan so eagerly.  It is just possible, of course, that gold is there—­it has been found in the Harz.  He says that the stuff is not brittle, and can be hammered and cut, which does not sound like an iron ore.  And his description of the rocks is too good to be his own fancy.  Again, the ore may be ’fool’s gold’,—­a mixture of copper and sulphur.  In that case you will know it right enough when you come to the roasting of it.  In any case I am interested enough in the tale to take a little trouble, and you and your private treasure-hunt happen to alloy very happily with my curiosity.”

“Guy,” said Alan, “you may laugh, but your aid means more to me than you know.  If the clerk’s tale is false you shall be repaid for your outlay.”

“Pshaw!” laughed Guy, “a copper mine is good enough to repay me.  And then, I take a certain interest in the manuscripts you are after.  After all, if you should find them it would be no stranger than those parchments coming to us as they did, through the very hands of both Gregory and Simon.  That was a golden jest—­but we must keep it hid for awhile.  And now, what I know of metals and their ways is at your service.”

Behold Alan then, after no more than the usual adventures of a journey, busied with a small furnace in a small stone-floored room over an archway in the walled city of Goslar.  It was a late spring and bitterly cold, and the heat of the fire was grateful.  Simon had thus far put off taking his companion to see the mine, and Alan had been occupied with fitting up a place in which the ore should be tested when the time came.

Hearing the blare of trumpets, he craned his head out of window, and caught a glimpse of the imperial banner flaunting and snapping in the chill wind.  He caught up cap and cloak and ran down the winding stone stairs, coming out upon the market-square just as the guards entered it.  So close that Alan could have touched him, there went by a humped and twisted figure with a jester’s bells and bauble—­a man with a maliciously smiling mouth and wicked, observant, tired eyes.  The white pointed beard and worn, lined face belonged to an older man than Alan had expected to see.  The eyes met his for a second, he flung his cloak over the left shoulder with the gesture Giovanni had taught him, and a few minutes later an impudent small page pulled his sleeve and whispered that Master Stefano desired to see him.

The boy led him through ancient streets to the entrance of a tall house near the wall, and went off whistling.  An old woman opened the door and showed him into a little ante-room where, the jester sat, perched upon the corner of a table.  Alan bowed, and waited in silence.

“Very well,” said the jester with a laugh.  “And now, since we are quite alone, why do you, an honest man, pretend to be the fellow of that rascally clerk?”