"'Fear not, good Hermann, the sleep of the innocent cannot be disturbed by a Spirit of Evil. Declare your wish and it shall be granted.'
"'Then hear me, fiend, devil, or whatever thou art! I would have my child happy; I would have her husband ever warm in his love for her as he is this moment; I would have the curse of her parents forever averted from her head. Grant me this and I am thine.'
"'It shall be so,' answered Varno, with something like pity in his tones. 'Thou must meet me at sunset on the evening of to-morrow, beside the Witch's Circle—there
shall our compact be fulfilled. This is the third and last. Remember.
"The dark spirit passed from the hut under the cliff but his shadow lingered behind; and the old hunter knelt beneath the swinging lamp, with the dead fawn at his feet, desolate and lone.
"The day smiled brightly on Marcella, the genial sunbeams dispelling night's horrors. She looked sadly when her father told her how the White Fawn had been wounded by some wandering hunter, and had sought the hut to die there; but the presence of Wilhelm made her cheerful as the morn, and Hermann felt rewarded for his sacrifice.
"A missionary monk stood within the old cabin, and said the words that joined two lives in one. When the holy rite was finished, the wedded pair knelt at the feet of The Demented, and called down Heaven's richest blessings on his head; but alas! he could not say 'Amen,' for he remembered his compact, and the words of Varno still rang in his ears. He watched his child with more than earthly care till the sun began to sink once more behind the Black Forest, then seizing his rifle, he kissed her blushing cheek, and sallied forth toward the mountains.
"'Dear father, may you soon give up such unholy pastimes,' murmured Marcella, looking fondly after him as his grey hairs floated in the wind.
"'God grant that he may,' murmured her husband, fervently, pressing her to his heart.
"But the old hunter returned no more. The wolf started as he lay in his lair, when a man rushed by his covert in the Black Forest. A bugle, wildly sounded, awoke