Out of the heaped coverings I saw presently a pair of eyes, great and dark, regarding me.
Then a little voice spoke, sweetly and clearly, but yet strangely sounding to me who had never before heard a babe speak.
"I want my father--tell him to send Grete, my maid, to attend on me, and then to come himself to sit by the bed and amuse me!" Alas! her father--well I knew what had come to him--that which in the mercy of the Duke Casimir and in the crowning mercy of the Red Axe, I had seen come to so many.

The dogs did not howl at all that morning.

They, too, were tired with the hunting and sated with the quarry.
All the same, I tried to answer my companion.
"Little Maid!" said I, "let me be your maid and your father.

I will gladly get you all you want.

But your good father has gone on a weary journey, and it will be long ere he can hope to return." "Well," she said, "send lazy Grete, then.