"It must be Schouts' castle!" Herman cried. "I'm certain of it!" he added, when he had scanned the country and was able to judge the distance of the burning mass from the city.
As the hours passed the flames died down, and later still the clouds of smoke dwindled away, leaving nothing but a red light in the sky. But in time there came the sound of a terrific explosion which seemed to shake the mill. It came again; and after that there was a hush, and the countryside subsided into silence and dense darkness.
"I'm going to find out what it means," said the forester; "but while I'm away be careful. Do whatever Mary says."
He moved down the ladder swiftly, and before long he was riding through the forest with his faithful dog at his heels. He did not return until next day; the moon had risen, but none had gone to bed, all being eager to know what he had seen, if he should return that night.
"You can have easy minds!" he exclaimed, when he and his cousin had mounted the ladder, he to tell the news, and she to hear it. "Sit down, every one of you," he said, with laughter in his face and eyes, and exultation in his voice. "'Tis fine news!"
As if to tantalise them all, he began to talk of trivialities—things that had no concern for any of them.
"Don't torment us, Otto," said his sweetheart, shaking him, as he sat at her side.
"I won't, then!" he exclaimed. "But what an impatient body it is," he added, turning to look Mary in the face. "But 'tis this. Schouts has been so much a terror of late that the river became impassable, and men would stand it no longer. Even the Emperor, to whom appeal was made, outlawed him; but he tortured the messenger, and drowned him in his moat. That roused His Majesty, and he determined to deal with him as one would deal with a savage beast who is a menace to society. He took his steps accordingly.
"A ship went down the stream—an innocent-looking craft, apparently full of merchandise, and the great bell of the castle rang out its loudest, and Schouts and his men went down the grass slope and boarded her. They found her empty of life, save for a man at the helm, and the moment the first of Schouts' soldiers clambered on board he dropped into the river and swam ashore. Then to Schouts' horror, as I suppose, cannon roared out at the ship from amid the forest on both sides of the stream and sank the boats that carried his soldiers to the vessel. Soon her deck became a shambles. The robber lord and his men were caught like rats in a trap. Schouts sprang overboard, to swim back and look to the safety of his castle, but a cannon shot caught him at the leap, and he fell dead in the stream, for he sank like a stone, and his heavy armour helped to drag him down. None who leapt into the water escaped, whichever bank they thought to reach. Man after man was hit, and seen to throw up his hands, and sink.
"Cries and the sound of guns had all the time been coming from the castle. There, too, the soldiers who had been sent to deal with the building itself were busy. The sound of the first shot fired at the decoy vessel was the signal to hundreds of soldiers who were hiding in the forest, close up to the castle moat. They swept out of the dense shadows in silence, and rushed across the drawbridge before the amazed wardens could drop the portcullis. In a few minutes the soldiers were swarming through the robber's stronghold, killing wherever there was resistance. So many of Schouts' servitors and fighting men had gone to the river to take part in the attack on the ship that little more than a handful were left to guard the castle, and these were either slain, or threw up their hands in token of surrender.