"Your highness!" said the old man in low, heart-rending tones. "Look at me, speak to me! It is your old Stadinger."
The well-known voice found its way to the dying man's ear; he opened his eyes slowly, and a faint smile crossed his face as he recognized his faithful servant.
"My old ghost of the woods," he said softly; "and you are with me at the last."
"But you'll not die, your highness," murmured Stadinger. His whole body was in a tremble, but he never took his eyes from his adored master. "No, you will not die, you will not die .'"
"Do you think it is so hard?" said Egon quietly. "Yesterday you were quite right, a burden was on my heart, now it is light. Take a greeting to dear Rodeck, and the forest, and to the lady of Ostwalden."
"To whom? To Frau von Wallmoden?" asked Stadinger, thinking he had not heard aright.
"Yes, tell her I send her my last greeting; she must think of me sometimes."
The words came slowly, brokenly, from the lips which would so soon refuse to do further service, but there was no mistaking their full significance. Eugen was startled when he heard his sister's name, and bent over the dying man, who looked into the countenance which so resembled Adelheid's, and again a smile lighted his face. Then he raised his head and laid it heavily on the breast of his old ghost of the woods, and the sunny blue eyes closed forever.
It was a short, painless battle with death, a peaceful falling to sleep. Stadinger hardly breathed while life remained in the body of him he had nursed as a babe and cherished as a man, but was to lose forever now. When all was over the old man lost control of himself, and threw himself in despair on the body of his beloved master, and sobbed like a child.