The bell tolled eleven; the pale figure vanished with a groan; the owls and night ravens flew screeching up into the air, and the skulls and bones clattered beneath their wings. William knelt down by his hearth of coals. He began steadily to cast, and, with the last sound of the bell, the first ball fell from the mould.
The owls and the skulls were quiet: but along the road an old woman, bent down with the weight of age, advanced towards the circle. She was hung round with wooden spoons, ladles, and other kitchen utensils, which made a frightful clattering. The owls screeched at her approach, and caressed her with their wings. Arrived at the circle, she stooped down to seize the bones and the skulls; but the coals hissed flames at her, and she drew back her withered hands from the fire. Then she paced round the circle, and grinning and chattering, held up her wares towards William. “Give me the skulls,” she gabbled; “give me the skulls, and I will give thee my treasures; give me the skulls, the skulls; what canst thou want with the trash? Thou art mine—mine, dear bridegroom; none can help thee: thou canst not escape me; thou must lead with me in the bridal dance. Come away, thou bridegroom mine!”
William’s breast throbbed; but he remained silent, and hastened on with his work. The old woman was not a stranger to him. A mad beggar had often haunted the neighbourhood, until she found an asylum in the mad-house. Now, he knew not whether her appearance was reality or a delusion. In a short time she grew enraged, threw down her stick, and chattered anew at William. “Take these for our nuptial night,” she cried: “the bridal bed is ready, and to-morrow, when evening cometh, thou wilt be wedded to me. Come soon, my love; delay not, my bridegroom; come soon.” And she hobbled slowly away into the forest.
Suddenly there arose a rattling like the noise of wheels, mingled with the cracking of whips and shouting of men. A carriage came headlong, with six horses and outriders. “What is the meaning of all this in the road?” cried the foremost horseman. “Room there!” William looked up. Fire sprung from the hoofs of the horses, and round the wheels of the carriage: it shone like the glimmering of phosphorus. He suspected a magical delusion, and remained quiet. “On, on, upon it!—over it!—down! down!” cried the horseman; and in a moment the whole troop stormed in headlong upon the circle. William plunged down to the earth, and the horses reared furiously above his head; but the airy cavalry whirled high in the air with the carriage, and, after turning several times round the magic circle, disappeared in a storm of wind, which tore the tops of the mightiest trees, and scattered their branches to a distance.
Some time elapsed ere William could recover from his terror. At length he compelled his trembling fingers to be steady, and cast a few balls without farther interruption. Again the well-known tower clock struck, and to him in the dreadful solitary circle, consoling as the voice of humanity, rose the sound from the habitations of men, but the clock struck the quarter thrice. He shuddered at the lightning-like flight of time; for a third part of his work was hardly done. Again the clock struck, for the fourth time!—Horror!—his strength was annihilated, every limb was palsied, and the mould fell out of his trembling hand. He listened, in the quiet resignation of despair, for the stroke of the full, the terrible, midnight hour. The sound hesitated—delayed—was silent. To palter with the awful midnight was too daring and too dangerous even to the dreadful powers of darkness. Hope again raised the sunk heart of William; he hastily drew out his watch, and beheld it pointing to the second quarter of the hour. He looked gratefully up towards heaven, and a feeling of piety moderated the transport, which, contrary to the laws of the dark world, would otherwise have burst forth in loud and joyous exclamations.
Strengthened, by the experience of the last half-hour, against any new delusion, William now went boldly on with his work. Every thing was silent around him, except that the owls snored in their uneasy sleep, and at intervals struck their beaks against the bones of the dead. Suddenly it was broken by a crackling among the bushes. The sound was familiar to the sportsman, and, as he expected, a huge wild boar broke through the briers, and came foaming towards the circle. Believing this to be a reality, he sprung hastily on his feet, seized his gun, and attempted to fire. Not a single spark came from the flint. Startled at his danger, he drew his hunting-knife to attack it,—when the bristly savage, like the carriage and the horses, ascended high above his head, and vanished into the silent fields of air.
The anxious lover worked on steadily to regain the time he had so unhappily lost. Sixty balls were cast. He looked joyfully upwards; the clouds were dispersing, and the moon again threw her bright rays upon the surrounding country; he was rejoicing in the approaching end of his labours, when an agonised voice, in the tones of Catherine, shrieked out the name of “William!” In the next moment, he beheld his beloved dart from among the bushes, and gaze fearfully around her. Following her distracted steps, and panting closely behind her, trod the mad beggar woman, extending her withered arms towards the fugitive, whose light dress, fluttering in the wind, she repeatedly attempted to grasp. Catherine collected her expiring strength in one desperate effort to escape, when the long-sought soldier of the forest planted himself before her and delayed her flight. The hesitation of the moment gained time for the mad woman, who sprung wildly upon Catherine, and grasped her in her long and fleshless hands. William could endure it no longer, he dashed the last ball from his hand, and was on the point of springing from the circle, when the bell tolled midnight, and the delusion vanished. The owls knocked the skulls and bones cluttering against each other, and flew up again to their hiding-places; the coals were suddenly extinguished; and William sunk, exhausted with fatigue, to the earth; but there was no rest for him in the forest; he was again disturbed by the slow and sullen approach of a stranger, mounted upon a huge coal-black steed: he stopped before the demolished magic circle, and, addressing the huntsman,—“You have stood the trial well,” said he; “what do you require of me?”
“Of you, stranger, nothing,” replied William; “of that of which I had need, I have prepared for myself.”
“But with my assistance,” continued the stranger; “therefore a share of it belongs to me.” “Certainly not,” replied the huntsman; “I have neither hired you nor called upon you.”
The horseman smiled. “You are bolder than your equals are wont to be,” said he. “Take then the balls which you have cast: sixty for you, three for me. The first hit, the second miss. When we meet again you will understand me.”