Mind you of Blass-
Gesell? I made a better beast of him by sending him three-quarters of
the road to hell for trial.' Bellowing, 'Take that!' he discharged a
broad blade, hitherto concealed in his right hand, straight at Rothhals.
It fixed in his cheek and jaw, wringing an awful breath of pain from him
as he fell against the wall.
'There's a lesson for you not to cross me, children!' said Werner,
striding his stumpy legs up and down the crashing board, and puffing his
monstrous girth of chest and midriff. 'Let him stop there awhile, to
show what comes of thwarting Werner!--Fire-devils! before the baroness,
too!--Something unholy is there? Something unholy in his jaw, I think!
--Leave it sticking! He's against meat last, is he? I'll teach you who
he's for!--Who speaks?'
All hung silent. These men were animals dominated by a mightier brute.
He clasped his throat, and shook the board with a jump, as he squeaked,
rather than called, a second time 'Who spoke?'
He had not again to ask. In this pause, as the Baron glared for his
victim, a song, so softly sung that it sounded remote, but of which every
syllable was clearly rounded, swelled into his ears, and froze him in his
angry posture.
'The blood of the barons shall turn to ice,
And their castle fall to wreck,
When a true lover dips in the water thrice,
That runs round Werner's Eck.
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