CHAPTER VIII
A MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS
“Count Paul found Christine insensible upon the road, excellency, and called at once to his steward, who followed him on horseback:
“‘Hans, do you know this woman?’
“‘I, Herr Count—donnerwetter, that I should know her! And yet——’
“‘Hans, you are a fool! I asked you if you knew the woman. Get down at once and lift her from the ground.’
“The steward lumbered off his horse and raised the girl in his arms. She lay with her white face hidden by the rushes at the roadside; but now the Count could see it, pale as it was, and pinched and wan, yet the face of Christine, unalterable in its sweetness.
“‘Herr Count,’ said the steward, ‘this is no woman from Jajce; she has the clothes of a peasant of Zara. And, Herr Count, I think that she is dead.’
“He spoke, they tell me, as if he had taken some dumb thing in his hands. That his master should be concerned because a peasant girl lay dying in the road was beyond his comprehension. He had seen them die by scores, for he had lived forty years in the mountains. One more or less—what matter? Oh, life is very cheap in Bosnia, excellency.
“The Count waited until his steward had raised Christine up; but no sooner had he looked upon her face than he sprang from his horse to bend over her and listen for a beat of the heart or a sign of breathing in the body. They laugh now when they tell the story in Jajce, excellency, for that was the first time their master had held a woman in his arms.
“He knelt at her side, and holding his hand upon her breast, he spoke again to his steward: