“Woman, is this indeed my son, and, if so, why did you not speak before we came to such extremity?”
“I cannot answer. I have sworn an oath. If you would learn who stands beside you, send a messenger to the Outlaw, saying you have killed him, as indeed you purposed doing,” then stretching out her arms, she said, with faltering voice: “Wilhelm, farewell,” and turning, fled toward the forest.
“Elsa, Elsa, come back!” the young man cried, foot on the parapet, but the girl paid no heed to his commanding summons, merely waving her hand without looking over her shoulder.
“Elsa!”
The name rang out so thrillingly strange that its reverberation instantly arrested the flying footsteps of the girl. Instinctively she knew it was the voice of a man falling rapidly through the air. She turned in time to see Wilhelm strike the ground, the impetus precipitating him prone on his face, where he lay motionless. The cry of horror from the battlements was echoed by her own as she sped swiftly toward him. The young man sprang to his feet as she approached and caught her breathless in his arms.
“Ah, Elsa,” he said, tenderly, “forgive me the fright I gave you, but I knew of old your fleetness of foot, and if the forest once encircled you, how was I ever to find you?”
The girl made no effort to escape from her imprisonment, and showed little desire to exchange the embrace she endured for that of the forest.
“Though I should blush to say it, Wilhelm, I fear I am easily found, when you are the searcher.”
“Then let old Schloss Schonburg claim you, Elsa, that the walls which beheld a son go forth, may see a son and daughter return.”