Andalusian. While she placed her little foot in his hand to spring
thence with graceful agility into the saddle, the widow, with forced
courtesy, invited the young gentleman to accompany her and her brother to
Prufening. There would be a merry meal, which she herself had provided,
in the farmhouse on the abbey lands.

Without giving a positive answer, Wolf bowed, and his heart quivered as
Barbara, from her beautiful gray horse, waved her riding whip to him as a
queen might salute a vassal.

How erect she sat in her saddle! how slender and yet how well rounded her
figure was! What rapture it would be to possess her charms!

That she would accept the elderly Schlumperger for the sake of his money
was surely impossible. And yet! How could she, with laughing lips, cast
to the wind the rare favour of fortune which permitted her to display her
art to the Emperor, and so carelessly leave him, Wolf, who had built the
bridge to their Majesties, in the lurch, unless she had some special
purpose in view; and what could that be except the resolution to become
the mistress of one of the richest houses in Ratisbon? The words "My
darling," which Frau Kastenmayr had called to Barbara, again rang in his
ears, and when the two ladies and the groom had vanished, he returned in
a very thoughtful mood to the faithful old maid-servant.

Every one else who was in the street or at the window looked after
Barbara, and pointed out to others the beautiful Jungfrau Blomberg and
the proud security with which she governed the spirited gray. She had
become a good rider, first upon her father's horses, and then at the
Wollers in the country, and took risks which many a bold young noble
would not have imitated.