Eventually the guards moved Brian to a cell--a different cell, and he wasn’t certain whether this was because they thought he had a way to escape the other one or merely because this one was available.  It was just as bare as the other, with a similar small high barred window.  He walked around the perimeter once, as if perhaps he might find the best place to sit, and then settled on the floor against the wall opposite the door.  He began to sing.

He was interrupted.

“Cooper!  Sind Sie das?”

It was Wilhelm.  Apparently the guards had not lied, but actually had captured him.  “Ja,” he answered, confirming that it was him.

“Wo ist--?”

He broke off, and that made sense; he was about to ask where Hans was, and if Cooper knew he shouldn’t say within earshot of the guards.  Of course, he didn’t know.  He explained, they were stopped, he tried to stand against the guards to defend the boy, but they said that they had already captured him, and Hans ran away shouting something about rescuing him.  Wilhelm said something Cooper took to be a curse.

“Der Apfel fällt nicht weit vom Stamm,” Cooper offered, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.  The sigh in response suggested that Wilhelm recognized the truth in that.

Things looked rather bleak.  Wilhelm was jailed, and Hans was almost certain to be caught trying to free him.  Cooper didn’t see what he could do about it from where he was.

Then, it struck him, he didn’t have to see what to do until it was time to do it.

He went back to singing.

There is a behind-the-writings look at the thoughts, influences, and ideas of this chapter, along with eleven other sequential chapters of this novel, in mark Joseph "young" web log entry #503:  Versers Progress.  Given a moment, this link should take you directly to the section relevant to this chapter.  It may contain spoilers of upcoming chapters.

As to the old stories that have long been here:

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