"Well, what do you say?" cried Meta.
Elsa could not answer; her soul was too full of the wonderful sight, and yet, as she repeated to herself, "How beautiful! oh, how beautiful!" her heart, which had been so light, grew sadder and more sad. With the impetuous music of the wind through the rustling branches at her feet, in the sullen thunder of the waves as, unseen by her eyes they broke upon the level shore, there mingled a melancholy tone--the reverberation of the dream from which she had awoke in such terror. Was not that crimson cloud, paling momentarily before the trembling light in the horizon, like the crimson curtain which had been drawn aside to show her that wonderful picture at the foot of the cross as it shone in the morning light; that picture of the two who were playing with her heart and laughing, while she was breaking it in grief and pain?
Lighter and lighter grew the horizon, their eyes could hardly bear the glory. At last the sun leapt up--a mass of light, a sheaf of rays, a ball of flame, before which the glow on sky and sea and earth as if in terror fled and vanished. Elsa was forced to close her eyes; she turned away, and when she opened them again--good heavens! what did she see?
They were standing a few paces from her, holding each other's hands and smiling, with the golden light of the sun shining full upon them. Was she dreaming again? or was it a delusion of her bewildered senses!
"This is too delightful!" cried Meta.
"Good-morning, Fräulein von Werben!" said Reinhold, as he withdrew his hand from Meta, who in her surprise had kept it a most indecorously long time, and came up to Elsa. "I must apologise again for disturbing you here. But how could I suppose that I should meet you in the forest at sunrise?"
"And may I ask what you are doing in the forest at sunrise. Captain Schmidt?" asked Meta.
Reinhold pointed with his hand over the sea, to a ship which had just rounded the promontory, and now seemed to be steering straight across the bay, leaving behind it a long straight streak of dark smoke:
"That is our steamer," said Reinhold, turning to Elsa. "She has been lying all night at anchor, behind Wissow Head, and is coming now, I suppose, to pick up our fellow-passengers. There, in the centre of the bay, you can just see the roofs over the edge of the dunes, lies Ahlbeck, the village where they were landed. The farmhouse, where we were yesterday evening, lies much nearer, and more to our right; but the spurs of the hill on which we now stand come between us and conceal it. I must make haste now to be able at least to signal to her from the shore. They will be surprised to see me come on board alone."
"Why should not we also go on board, if it would be so easy?" asked Elsa.