"Yet he dared not jump as the Baron did."

"The Baron was afraid of my father; that's why he jumped."

"Not so. It was your father who feared to follow him, though he had a
sword and the Baron had none. You are all cowards in Castle Schonburg.
I don't believe you have the courage to jump even though I held out my
arms to catch you, but if you do I will give you the sword I wear."

The little boy had climbed on the parapet, and now stood hovering on
the brink of the precipice, his childish heart palpitating through fear
of the chasm before him, yet beneath its beatings was an insistent
command to prove his impugned courage. For some moments there was deep
silence, the man below gazing aloft and holding up his hands. At last
he lowered his outstretched arms and said in a sneering tone:

"Good-bye, craven son of a craven race. You dare not jump."

The lad, with a cry of despair, precipitated himself into the empty air
and came fluttering down like a wounded bird, to fall insensible into
the arms that for the moment saved him from death or mutilation. An
instant later there was a shriek from the negligent nurse, and the man-
at-arms ran along the battlements, a bolt on his cross-bow which he
feared to launch at the flying abductor, for in the speeding of it he
might slay the heir of Schonburg. By the time the castle was aroused
and the gates thrown open to pour forth searchers, the man had
disappeared into the forest, and in its depths all trace of young
Wilhelm was lost. Some days after, the Count von Schonburg came upon
the deserted camp of the outlaws, and found there evidences, not
necessary to be here set down, that his son had been murdered.