The last of the stone slabs that covered the vault had crunched back in its place with a resounding crash. Hans Eberhard von Schranden lay with his ancestors. In the little chapel, the men who had acted as grave-diggers bared their heads and said a short prayer. The torches that had burnt down to their sockets smouldered on the smooth surface of the flagstones, and cast a lurid glow as they flickered out over the stern faces of the worshippers.

Then without looking round at Boleslav they left the chapel. He stood in a remote corner with his hands before his face, brooding fiercely on the future that lay before him. The echoing footsteps roused him, and silently he followed his friends, letting the iron gate of the chapel that had been broken open when they came in, swing back in the lock.

The moon had again pierced the clouds, and illumined with a weird radiance the mounds and crosses that stood in regular rows, like columns drawn up for battle.

"Do you wish to bait me too?" Boleslav murmured as he contemplated the graves for a moment with a bitter smile. At the gate he overtook his friends. They joined the men on guard, who now had nothing to watch, for, with the exception of a group of women and old men who stood gossiping by the hedge, the street was empty. Hoots were heard proceeding from the distant fields, where the mob apparently were still in full pursuit.

"God have mercy on her, if they catch her!" said Karl Engelbert with folded hands. Then two of his comrades, one of whom was Peter Negenthin, came up to him and whispered earnestly in his ear.

Boleslav was too lost in thought to notice their strange and unnatural behaviour towards himself, and was not even aware, as they walked through the village, that he was always left to walk alone, though now and then he stepped confidentially to the side of one or other of them. He had accomplished the first chapter of his work. His father was laid to rest as befitted his rank, and yet it seemed as if the real work was only just beginning. He beheld all he had to do towering like a great inaccessible mountain in front of him. The mouldering ruins must be built up again; what was now a waste overgrown by weeds must be restored to a waving sea of golden corn; he must strive to endow his neglected property with new wealth, and his tarnished name with new honour: and then he saw, as the goal of all this striving, the face of the beloved beckoning him onwards. If he was too bowed down now with a consciousness of shame and disgrace to look into her pure, maidenly eyes, then he would be able to go to her and say, "Now, all is expiated. I am worthy to lay myself at your feet." Yes, he would struggle tooth and nail--work day and night--to attain this end.

At first it seemed almost madness to think of such a gigantic undertaking.... But he had his friends to help him.... After all, it would not be a single-handed struggle. Had not they to-day helped him to achieve the impossible? Would not they, true to their sacred oath, continue to stand by him in need with their advice and sympathy? And perhaps their noble example would in time break down the barrier that divided him from his fellow-creatures, and lead to his father's sin being at last consigned to the limbo of forgotten history.

Higher and higher rose his hopes as he meditated thus. They had left the village street behind them, and now reached the drawbridge, where the vehicles had been put up. The horses, each with its nose in a bundle of hay, waited patiently by the fence to which they were tethered. Immediately, without a moment's delay, the comrades set to work to harness them.

This frightened Boleslav out of his dream.

"What!" he exclaimed. "Off already, before I have thanked you?"

No one spoke.

"Won't you take a glass of wine now the job is finished? And I wanted to ask your advice about other matters."

Peter Negenthin strode up, and looking him straight in the face, drew his clenched fist from the sling.

"We would rather die of thirst," he hissed through his set teeth, "than take a drink of water from your hand."

Boleslav staggered backwards as if he had been hit between the eyes. He felt the earth reeling beneath his feet.

Then Karl Engelbert stepped forth from his sullen little band.

"It is much to be deplored, Baumgart--I call you so because you have been Baumgart to us till this minute--it is much to be deplored that you should thus be bluntly told of what our present feelings are towards you. Why did not you hold your tongue, Negenthin?... But the words have been spoken and cannot be recalled, so now you may as well know all. You summoned us, and we came. Some of us, it is true, were of opinion that we weren't obliged to obey your summons, considering you had deceived us about your name; but others said, whether it was Baumgart or no, we were bound by the oath taken in the church at Dannigkow, after our first battle--and none of us were desirous of breaking an oath. That is why we are here. You can imagine that we didn't come willingly. We are honest fellows, and to tell the truth, the work you gave us to do went against the grain. The long and short of it is, that when we go home, and people spit in our faces, we must put up with it, for they will have right on their side."

"Why didn't you say all this before?" Boleslav stammered forth. "Why, oh why have you let it come to my standing here before you--like a--like a--Ha! ha! ha! If you spit in my face, I must put up with it!"

"You need not reproach yourself on our account," Engelbert replied. "You have quite enough to bear without that. But now that we have discharged our duty--without grumbling, you must admit--I can only ask you, on behalf of myself and my comrades, to release us from our oath, as we release you from yours. Of course we cannot compel you against your wish, but all I can say is, that if you don't choose to do it, we must leave home and kindred, and wander forth into the world, lest people----"

"Stop!" cried Boleslav, feeling as if more would kill him. "Your desire is fulfilled. I now wish it as earnestly as you do. Of a truth I should deserve my disgrace, were I ever to ask another favour of you.... I will not even insult you by saying 'Many thanks' for the service you have just rendered me. May God reward you, and may He forgive you for having put me in my present position; rather would I have thrown the corpse into the river and myself after it; let us say no more. Perhaps you will allow me to assist in putting the horses in, as there is nothing else I can do for you?"

"I am sorry," Engelbert said, his voice quivering with emotion; "it pains us deeply. We are as fond of you yourself as we have ever been--but, you see----"

"I see all, dear Engelbert; no excuses are necessary."

"Well then, we wish you farewell."

"Farewell!"

The horses were put in. All were in readiness to start. Staring vacantly before him, Boleslav leant against the wall. Engelbert turned and took a last look at him from the box-seat.

"And don't forget Regina!" he said. "That is to say, if she escapes with her life. It is to her, not to us, you are indebted."

"Very well," answered Boleslav, not taking in the meaning of what had been said to him.

"Adieu!"

"Adieu, and bon voyage!"

The drivers cracked their whips; in another moment the heavy wheels had thundered over the loose flooring of the drawbridge. Like silver-girt phantoms the coaches disappeared in the misty moonlight.

He was alone--more alone than any outcast in God's wide world. What should he do?

He began wearily to drag his footsteps up the incline. The brambles that tangled the ground wound round his ankles. A firefly made a zigzag thread of flame in front of him. From the top of the hill the great, weird, dark masses of the Castle ruins looked down on him, as if threatening to fall on him and bury him beneath their debris. Through the yawning window-casements the moon shone, giving them the appearance of huge ghostly eyes. He roamed absently past the towers, a sudden exhaustion weighing like lead upon his limbs. If only he could fall asleep and never wake again.

He tried to remember what it was his friend had called out to him from the coach at parting. He racked and racked his brains, but his memory failed him.

The grass plot, where he had first found the half-wild girl, lay before him brightly illumined by the moon. The spot where she had begun to dig the grave stood out in uncanny blackness from the rest of the shining turf.

If only he had shovelled the corpse into it and gone on his way, perhaps somewhere at the other end of the world some sort of happiness might still have been in store for him.

But now it was too late. Now all he could do was to endure--to complete the work of defiance begun to-day under such gloomy circumstances. Desolate and alone till the end. Never to feel again the clasp of a friendly hand, never to look with trust and affection into any human face, since the doughty comrades he had so firmly believed in had recoiled from him shuddering.

And had not the beloved shrunk from him too in horror? It seemed clear now for the first time why she had avoided him and hidden herself.

He was cut adrift from all the joys and sorrows that form a common bond between the hearts of men--cut adrift from love, hope, compassion, from everything but ignominy and hate.

With his face buried in his hands, he staggered over the lawn in the direction of the gardener's cottage, when his foot struck against something round and soft that lay across the path. It was the figure of a woman, lying with her head buried in the dry leaves and her limbs outstretched. Regina--positively it was Regina!

"What are you doing here? Get up."

There was not a sound or a movement. Where had he seen her last? Ah! to be sure; under the churchyard gateway, screening him from the gun that was pointed at his brain. That ghastly moment came back to him with all its terrors. For his sake she had flung herself on the murderer; for his sake risked her life. And how had he rewarded her? He had pushed carelessly past her; consigned her to the mercy of the murderous, bloodthirsty crew who were greedy to take her life, without a shadow of a thought of how he might save her troubling him for an instant. Even if she were the most abandoned creature on the face of the earth, she had not deserved such dastardly treatment at his hands. Certainly she had not.

"Regina, wake up."

He bent over her and raised her, but her head fell back lifeless among the bushes. There was blood on his fingers from touching her. Her hair was damp and matted.

Was she dead? No; it must not, could not be. Sacrificed for him; that would mean adding original guilt to the sin he had inherited, and the idea of owing so much to such a degraded creature, was in the last degree humiliating. She must at least live till he had paid her. He tore open her chemise with a rough, eager hand, and laid his ear on the cool, rounded breast.

God be praised! Her heart was still beating. And as he raised her once more, she slowly opened her great eyes and looked round her vacantly. As if shocked at being caught holding her thus, he let her head slip out of his arms.

She moaned slightly as she sank back, for the swaying briars hurt her. Then regaining consciousness, she lifted herself on her elbow and gazed at him in dumb inquiry.

"Get up, Regina," he said.

The sound of his voice made her tremble. She tried to struggle on to her feet, but fell back helplessly.

"Let me lie where I am," she begged, with a timid, imploring glance.

"Stand up. I will help you."

"Must I go?" she asked, evading the proffered support. Grief and anxiety were depicted on her blood-stained, beautiful face.

"You would rather stay with me?"

"Ah, Herr, how can you ask?"

"But you'll have a bad time of it if you do."

"Oh, no, Herr. The gnÄdiger Herr used to whip me every day. I am quite accustomed to it."

"But somewhere else they would treat you better."

"Somewhere else?" New consternation showed itself on her features.

"Good God! A woman like you, who is willing and hard-working, and has such strong limbs, is sure----"

She shook her head violently. "I shouldn't go far, Herr. If you hunt me away, I shall only lie down in a ditch and starve to death."

A softer look came into his eyes. No matter how bad, stupid, and corrupt she might be, she was the only human being in the wide world who clung to him. Why should he drive her from his threshold, when he himself was despised, ostracised, and a social outcast? Were they not both under the ban of the same misfortune?