"Of whom art thou speaking, dear?" demanded the wondering, but not the less awe-struck, Adelheid, believing that the weakened nerves of the poor girl were unstrung by the horror of the spectacle--"it is a traveller like ourselves, that has unhappily perished in the very storm from which, by the kindness of Providence, we have been permitted to escape. Thou shouldst not tremble thus; for, fearful as it is, he is in a condition to which we all must come."
"So soon! so soon! so suddenly--oh! it is he!" Adelheid, alarmed at the violence of Christine's feelings, was quite at a loss to account for them, when the relapsed grasp and the dying voice showed that her friend had fainted. Sigismund was one of the first to come to the assistance of his sister, who was soon restored to consciousness by the ordinary applications. In order to effect the cure she was borne to a rock at some little distance from the rest of the party, where none of the other sex presumed to come, with the exception of her brother. The latter staid but a moment, for a stir in the little party at the bone-house induced him to go thither. His return was slow, thoughtful, and sad.
"The feelings of our poor Christine have been unhinged, and she is too easily excited to undergo the vicissitudes of a journey" observed Adelheid, after having announced the restoration of the sufferer to her senses; "have you seen her thus before?"
"No angel could be more tranquil and happy than my cruelly treated sister was until this last disgrace;--you appear ignorant yourself of the melancholy truth?"
Adelheid looked her surprise.
"The dead man is he who was so lately intended to be the master of my sister's happiness, and the wounds on his body leave little doubt that he has been murdered."
The emotion of Christine needed no further explanation.
"Murdered!" repeated Adelheid, in a whisper.
"Of that frightful truth there can be no question. Your father and our friends are now employed in making the examinations which may hereafter be useful in discovering the authors of the deed."
"Sigismund?"