'Do not alarm Wanda,' he said feebly. 'It is a scratch; it will be nothing. Take me home.'
With his left hand he felt for the hair bracelet on his right arm, between the shoulder and the wrist. It was stiff with his own blood.
Then Vàsàrhely leaned over him and met his upward gaze, and said in his ear, that seemed still filled with the rushing of many waters, 'You are Vassia Kazán!'
When a little later the huntsman returned, bringing the physician, whom he had met a mile nearer the house in the woods, and some peasants bearing a litter made out of pine branches and wood moss, they found Sabran stretched insensible beside the water-pool; and Egon Vàsàrhely, who stood erect beside him, said in a strange tone:
'I have stanched the blood, and he has swooned, you see. I commit him to your hands. I am not needed.'
And, to their surprise, he turned and walked away with swift steps into the green gloom of the dense forest.
[CHAPTER XIX.]
Sabran was still insensible when he was carried to the house.
When he regained consciousness he was on his own bed, and his wife was bending over him. A convulsion of grief crossed his face as he lifted his eyelids and looked at her.