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"But the Prince Dietrich Hohenfriedberg was beheaded within the hour, and, as is their hellish custom, his body was thrown to the Duke's blood-hounds that were clamoring all the time behind their fence. "God help us such a disaster that night was for Plassenburg! Will the Prince never set about wiping away the disgrace?"
An enclosure had been formed for him by the palace wall, covered with a red hanging, as though my sweetheart's death were a gala sight. And when he had come to the front and arranged his folk, lo! there by his side stood Ysolinde, Princess of Plassenburg, with her father, Master Gerard. They had a place close by the Duke, and Otho ofttimes bent over to confer graciously with his councillor.
I declare I grow rotten and thewless in this dull Plassenburg, where they dare not stick so much as a knife in one another, all for fear of Karl Miller's Son! Since I cannot adventure forth on my own account, I am become a man that wearies for news. Tell me every part of the affair, concealing nothing. But if you can, relate even your own share in it as faithfully as becomes a modest youth."
"Nothing beyond that bit of metal which hangs by your side, Prince Karl," said Dessauer, pointing to his Highness's sword. The Prince looked down at the strong, unadorned hilt thoughtfully and sighed. "I would I had another to transmit this sword to, as well as the power to wield it, when I take my place as usurper in the histories of the Princes of Plassenburg."
They were then marched, under charge of the soldiers of Plassenburg, to various strongholds which were pointed out by the Burgomeister and the chiefs of the guilds. The fortified halls of the trades were filled with them.
Aye, and you yourself, Hugo Gottfried, shall work out in flowing blood and bitter tears the doom of the pale trembling girl for whom you have rejected and despised Ysolinde, Princess of Plassenburg!" How I stumbled down the stairs and found myself outside the house in the Weiss Thor I do not know. Whether the servitor, Sir Respectable, showed me out or not has quite passed from me.
They shook us again and again by the hand. They clapped us on the back. They examined professionally the dead who lay strewn about. "A good stroke! Well smitten!" they cried, as they turned them over, like spectators who applaud at a game they can all understand. Specially did they compliment me on my axe-work. Never had anything like it been seen in Plassenburg.
"To the city of Thorn," said he, more briskly than was his wont, so that I knew he had tidings to communicate. "Saw you the Lady Helene?" I asked, eagerly, of them. He shook his head, yet pleasantly. "Nay," said he, "I saw her not. The Red Tower is not a healthy place for men of Plassenburg, nor yet the White Gate and the house of Master Gerard von Sturm.
"The Little Playmate," I said, "the maid whom I have ever loved, though I am not worthy to touch her, is no chance child, no daughter of the Red Axe of Thorn. Leopold von Dessauer hath found and sent to Karl the Prince the full proofs that Helene is the daughter of the last and rightful Prince, and therefore in her own right Princess of Plassenburg." "You lie, fool!" she cried "you lie!
"Who dared tell you ?" cried I, quick as fire, laying my hand on my sword. "The false common flowers by the wayside tell me!" said Helene, pertly. "Let them beware, or I will take their heads off for rank weeds!" I answered. For at that time, in the Court of Plassenburg, we talked in figures and romance words.
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