Hartmut's eyes rested on the distant shimmer, but he heeded not its light; all was dark and gloomy within him this night. He had not spoken to Adelheid von Wallmoden since the memorable day in the forest, until he met her to-day walking beside her bleeding and unconscious husband, whom they were bearing to his death bed. The moment forbade everything but action, and Rojanow had not attempted to enter the sick room, but had waited outside for the physician's reports. Neither had he showed himself when Frau von Eschenhagen appeared, but he had spoken later with Herr von Schönau and Willibald. Now all was over, Herbert von Wallmoden was no longer numbered among the living, and his wife, his widow, was free!
Hartmut breathed heavily at this thought, but it brought him no joy. His feelings were changed since that hour when he had staked his all and lost, for he loved this woman now, madly. This sudden death had showed him the chasm which yawned between them, a chasm no less because Adelheid's marriage bonds were broken. Her aversion had been for the man who believed in nothing, and to whom nothing was sacred, and that man was as great a scoffer, as great an unbeliever to-day as ever.
He had pleaded for forgiveness in the character to which he had given her name in "Arivana," but that Ada had disappeared again in the heights above after giving her warning cry, leaving to their fate the creatures she had exhorted, with their earthly passionate hates and loves. Hartmut Rojanow could not force the wild blood in his veins to run in quiet grooves, he could not bend to a life of strict and narrow duty, and he would not! What were the use of all those gifts which he felt were his, if they did not lift him out of the old ruts, did not raise him above the duties and limits of the commonplace world? He knew well that those great blue eyes urged him to follow the paths which he hated so bitterly, and which, he told himself over and over again, he could never take.
The rosy shimmer yonder over the forest had grown deeper as it mounted higher in the heavens. Unmovable it shone in the north, mysterious, far and high—the great northern light in its dawning splendor!
A roll of carriage wheels and sound of horses' hoofs coming at great speed waked Hartmut from his dream. It was past nine, who could be coming at so late an hour? Perhaps the second physician, who had been sent for early in the day, but had not yet answered the summons; perhaps some one from Ostwalden, where the news had been sent late. The carriage turned into the broad road, and came on crunching and cracking over the icy ground, and drew up under the wide porte cochere at the side of the house. Hartmut, who was virtually master of the place, left his room and hastened to see who had come or what was wanted.
He had taken but a step or two down the stairs which led to the entrance hall, when he stopped suddenly and held his breath with a gasp. There sounded a voice which he had not heard for ten long years. It spoke in a low, subdued tone, and yet he recognized it at the first word.
"I come from the Prussian Embassy," the new-comer explained. "We received the telegram early this afternoon, and I started at once. How is he? Can I see Herr von Wallmoden?"
Stadinger, who admitted the stranger, answered in a low tone. Hartmut did not hear what he said, but could imagine from the next words:
"Then I come too late!"
"Yes, sir; the Baron died this afternoon." There was a short pause, then the stranger said: