"Thou prince of all babbling braggarts!" cried Conrad, when the story was ended: "Can't you open your mouth, man, without lying? and yet you are already come to years. Folks that hold traffic for any time with spirits, grow shar-pwitted. The dealings of these creatures are with supernatural out-of-the-way things; and when they pay us a visit, the very terrour they arouse, till one grows used to them a bit, gives one something impressive and dignified."
"More especially," cried Michael somewhat angered, "when one has been sleeping a night in a potato field."
"That night," answered Conrad, "and that abominable mischance, that foul scandalous deed of a vagabond, will be the death of me; I know it as well as you. I shall not hold out much longer."
"May be so," said the pale stranger; "yet you can't tell all this while whether I too may not be one of these goblins, who has been trying to cure you of your follies. To be good friends with you, my rough-spoken, overbearing sir, it was verily requisite that you should have treated me with a little more civility. Wisdom, experience, strength of mind, may often be learnt from those in whom one is the slowest to look for them. If however, my good companions, you would like to know which of you all will die first, I have a way of telling you that in a moment."
They all seated themselves in a circle on benches and stools. The stranger pulled a plated box out of his pocket, while he continued: "When this little chip which I am going to light is burning, you must pass it quickly from hand to hand, and the person in whose hold it goes out will be the first of us to see the next world."
All lookt at the stranger in anxious expectation. He thrust a little bit of wood down into the box, while he muttered some sounds, and then he drew it out again burning and flickering. Eleazar, who sat next to him, received it, gave it to his neighbour, and thus the match went on spitting sparks from one hand to another. It had finisht the round, and come back to Eleazar, who was very loth to take it, and was hastily passing it on, when on the sudden it flared brightly and then went out between his fingers. "Stupid stuff!" he cried sulkily, as he threw the bit of wood on the ground and jumpt up in a passion; "Nothing but empty superstition! And we are so good-natured as to let ourselves be made the tools of such nonsense."
He lookt sharply at the stranger with his glaring eyes, then slapt him on the shoulder, and withdrew with him. Meanwhile the moon had arisen, and was pouring its bright light over the forests and rocks: the party went each his own way, and Edward too bent his steps homeward. As he was walking up the narrow footpath, he heard a warm discussion; it sounded like a quarrel; and when he drew nearer he fancied he distinguisht Eleazar and the stranger. He struck off therefore into another path, partly for the sake of avoiding them and not being forced to return in their company, partly too that he might not have the air of wishing to overhear what they were disputing about; for Eleazar was of a very suspicious temper, and mistrusted everybody, though he took it extremely ill if any one did not place an unlimited confidence in him.
In the house everything was quiet: except that Rose was singing a simple air with a supprest voice, scarce audibly in her remote chamber. Edward was moved by it, and so strongly, that he could not help being surprised at his extreme susceptibility. Before he fell asleep, his melancholy had so increast, that he could hardly refrain from shedding tears.
A few days after this Edward observed the stranger coming out of Herr Balthasar's apartment. He wondered what such a person could have had to do there; and, when he entered the old man's room, he found him violently disturbed and enraged.