"For the Holy Virgin's sake, little maid, put the Red Axe down!" I cried,
whisperingly. "You know not what you do!"

Then even as I spoke I saw that my father had drawn himself up in bed,
and that he too was staring at the strange, elfish figure. Gottfried
Gottfried, as I remember him in these days, was a tall, dark, heavily
browed man, with a shock of bushy blue-black hair, of late silvering at
the temples--grave, sombre, quiet in all his actions.

But what was my surprise as the little maid came nearer to the bed
with her pretty dancing movement, carrying the axe much as if it had
been an over-heavy babe, to see the Duke's Justicer suddenly skip over
the far side of the bedstead and stand with his red cloak about him,
watching her.




CHAPTER IV

THE PRINCESS HELENE


"What devil's work is this?" he said, frowning at her severely.

And I confess that I trembled, but not so the little maid.

"Do not be afraid, mannie," she said, laying down the axe on the stock of
the couch, against which its broad red blade and glass-clear cutting edge
made an irregular patch of light. "Come and sit down beside me on your