Should the
time seem favorable for you to visit Frankfort, and if your guardian
consents, I shall raise not even one objection."
"Oh, dear Father, I do not lay this as a command upon you."
"No; a request is quite sufficient. To-morrow morning I shall set out."
"Along the Rhine?" queried the girl, so eagerly that the old man's eyes
twinkled at the celerity with which she accepted his proposition.
"I think it safer," he said, "to journey inland over the hills. The
robbers on the Rhine have been so long bereft of the natural prey that
one or other of them may forget I am Father Ambrose, a poor monk,
remembering me only as Henry of the rich House of Sayn, and therefore
hold me for ransom. I would not willingly be a cause of strife, so I
shall go by way of Limburg on the Lahn, and there visit my old friend
the Bishop, and enjoy once more a sight of the ancient Cathedral on the
cliff by the river."
When the young Countess awoke next morning, and reviewed in her mind the
chief event of the preceding day, remembering the reluctance of Father
Ambrose to undertake the quest she had outlined without the consent of
his overlord the Archbishop, a feeling of compunction swept over her.
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