'
'Lisbeth! Lisbeth!' they heard Gottlieb calling impatiently.
'We come, Gottlieb!' and in a low murmur Margarita heard her say: 'May
this day pass without trouble and shame to the pious and the chaste.'
Margarita knew the voice of the stranger before she had opened the door,
and on presenting herself, the hero gave her a guardian-like salute.
'One may see,' he said, 'that it requires better men than those of Werner
to drive away the rose from that cheek.'
Gottlieb pressed the rosy cheek to his shoulder and patted her.
'What do you think, Grete? You have now forty of the best lads in
Cologne enrolled to protect you, and keep guard over the house night and
day. There! What more could a Pfalzgrafin ask, now? And voluntary
service; all to be paid with a smile, which I daresay my lady won't
refuse them. Lisbeth, you know our friend. Fear him not, good Lisbeth,
and give us breakfast. Well, sweet chuck, you're to have royal honours
paid you. I warrant they've begun good work already in locking up that
idle moony vagabond, Farina--'
'Him? What for, my father? How dared they! What has he done?'
'O, start not, my fairy maid! A small matter of breakage, pet! He tried
to enter Cunigonde Schmidt's chamber, and knocked down her pot of lilies:
for which Berthold Schmidt knocked him down, and our friend here, out of
good fellowship, knocked down Berthold.
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