For the first moment Paul was so surprised by the girl's extraordinary beauty that he, usually so ready with an answer, could not find a word to say in reply. His amazement, so evident in his face, increased Hilda's merriment. She sprang up lightly from where she was sitting and made a profound courtesy, saying, "I see I must introduce myself, or my cousin Leo will not deign to say one word to me. Fräulein Hilda von Heydeck has the honour to receive her cousin among the Reifenstein rocks. In her own distinguished person she has descended from the enchanted castle to guide her bewildered cousin into the right path. And now give me your hand, Leo; we shall soon be the best of friends, if you are only half as delightful as papa says you are."
She held out her hand to Paul, who took it and kissed it, whereupon she withdrew it hastily, saying, with a blush, "That is not the custom with us, cousin!"
"In Germany a man has a right to kiss his lovely cousin's cheek," Paul replied, having quickly recovered from his first surprise; "but I dare not lay claim to such a privilege, since I am not the happy man you think me, but only his poor friend, Paul Delmar."
Hilda blushed crimson. "You are not my cousin Leo?" she asked, in great confusion.
"No, unfortunately not; I wish I were. My friend Leo is down below somewhere trying to find a path out of this rocky labyrinth. Leo! Leo! where are you?"
"Here!" Leo's voice replied, from a considerable distance. He had mistaken the direction whence the sound of Hilda's laugh was heard, and had consequently plunged more deeply into the bewildering labyrinth. Paul's repeated call told him where his friend was to be found; he scrambled over several rocks and finally reached the foot of the huge mass upon which Paul and Hilda were standing.
"Most fortunate of mortals!" Delmar called down to him, "come up here. I will give you a hand, that you may display all the grace you are master of in ascending. Here you will find the lovely fairy who reigns in the enchanted Castle Reifenstein, and who has descended to aid us miserable mortals."
With no less astonishment than Delmar had experienced Leo now looked up at Hilda, who was standing beside his friend; he, too, recognized her from the postmaster's description, and he, too, thought her extremely beautiful. Still her beauty made no extraordinary impression upon him; he thought the worthy innkeeper's enthusiastic comparison of her to an angel rather exaggerated; nevertheless he was most pleasantly surprised by this encounter with his cousin.
Before Paul could hold out a hand to help her she sprang lightly down from rock to rock until she stood beside Leo, to whom she held out her hand with the same easy grace with which she had offered it to his friend. This time, however, although it was grasped cordially, it was not kissed, and was instantly relinquished.
Leo had anticipated with a certain anxiety his first meeting with the cousin whose hand had been destined by the will of her father and of his own to be bestowed upon him. He now stood face to face with the destined bride whom he had made up his mind never to marry, without any of the embarrassment he had expected to feel when he should first see her. No; any uncomfortable sensation of the kind was entirely dispelled by Hilda's easy frank reception of him as a near relative. She evidently saw in him, not a future lover, but simply her cousin Leo, to whom she was ready and pleased to show all the familiar kindness warranted by their close relationship, and he was instantly as much at his ease with her as if they had known each other for years.