As may be imagined, the news of the encounter between Henry Schulte and Nat Toner was noised about the village, and during the next day the matter became the universal theme of conversation. It was astonishing, however, to remark the unanimity of opinion which prevailed with regard to it. The entire community with one accord united in condemning the insult and applauding its resentment; and when Nat Toner made his appearance the following day, bearing upon his face the marks of the punishment he had received, he was greeted with cold salutations and marked evidence of avoidance by those who heretofore had been disposed to be friendly, and even gracious.
This only intensified his anger at the cause of his humiliation, but he concealed his emotions and shortly afterwards returned to his home.
The anxiety of Emerence for the safety of her lover was most profound, and trembling with fear of the threatened revenge of Nat Toner, for his oath had also been repeated, she besought Henry to be watchful and cautious of his unscrupulous adversary, all of which he laughingly and assuringly promised to do. Not so much for his own security, of which he had no fear, as for the sake of the dear girl who was so solicitous for his welfare, and to whom his safety was a matter of so much importance.
The next few days passed uneventfully away, Nat remaining at home, nursing his wrath and the wounds upon his face, and Henry Schulte attending to his various duties upon the farm. The quarrel finally ceased to be a matter of remark, and the simple-minded villagers, believing that Nat's threats were only the utterances of a man crazed with drink, and smarting under the punishment he had received, quieted their fears and resumed their ordinary peaceful and contented mode of living.
To Nat Toner the days passed all too slowly, but with the slowly-moving hours, in the seclusion of his own home, and his own evil thoughts, his revenge became the one object of his life. His reckless, vagabond existence of the past few years, during which it was hinted by several of the villagers, with many shrugs of their shoulders and wise noddings of their venerable heads, he had been engaged in the service of a bold and successful French smuggler, had not tended to elevate his mind, or to humanize his disposition. His depraved nature and vicious habits were roused into full action by this encounter with Henry Schulte, and the anger of his heart was in no wise lessened, as he reflected that he had brought his injuries upon himself. All the brutal instincts of his degraded disposition were aflame, and he resolved that his revenge for the indignities that had been put upon him, should be full and complete.
With a fiendish malignity he determined to strike at the heart of his antagonist through the person of the object of his love, and by that means to be revenged upon both.
A Moonlight Walk.—An Unexpected Meeting.—The Murder of Emerence Bauer.—The Oath Fulfilled.
On a beautiful moonlight evening, about a week after the hostile meeting of Henry Schulte and Nat Toner, Emerence, all impatient to meet her lover, whom she had not seen for some days, and whom she fondly expected this evening, left the residence of her parents and walked towards a little stream that ran along the outskirts of the village, where she had been in the habit of meeting Henry upon the occasions of his visits.
The evening was a delightful one, and the scene one of surpassingly romantic beauty. The bright rays of the moon sparkled and danced upon the rippling water; the border of grand old trees that fringed the bank of the stream was reflected with exaggerated beauty far down among the waters; the glittering stars stole in and out among their branches, and shone in the clear crystal mirror. Now a fleecy speck of cloud floated over the face of the Queen of Night, from behind which she would soon emerge, with increased brilliancy, to dart her long arrowy beams away down to the pebbly bottom of the flowing river, kissing the fairies that the old German legends tell us dwelt there in the days of old.