The apparition of Zacharias stunned him to immovability. But as the Judge was about to cry out, he exclaimed:
“In the name of Heaven, do not call. I am no robber—I love Charlotte!”
“And—she—she?” stammered Zacharias.
“She loves me also! Oh, you need have no fear if you are one of her relations. We were betrothed at the Kusnacht feast. The fiancés of the Grinderwald and the Entilbach have the right to visit in the night. It is a custom of Unterwald. All the Swiss know that.”
“Yeri Foerster—Yeri, Charlotte’s father, never told me.”
“No, he does not know of our betrothal yet,” said the other, in a lower tone of voice; “when I asked his permission last year he told me to wait—that his daughter was too young yet—we were betrothed secretly. Only as I had not the Forester’s consent, I did not come in the night-time. This is the first time. I saw Charlotte in the town; but the time seemed so long to us both that I ended by confessing all to my father, and he has promised to see Yeri tomorrow. Ah, Monsieur, I knew it would give such pleasure to Charlotte that I could not help coming to announce my good news.”
The poor old man fell back in his chair and covered his face with his hands. Oh, how he suffered! What bitter thoughts passed through his brain; what a sad awakening after so many sweet and joyous dreams.
And the young mountaineer was not a whit more comfortable, as he stood leaning against a corner of the wall, his arms crossed over his breast, and the following thoughts running through his head:
“If old Foerster, who does not know of our betrothal, finds me here, he will kill me without listening to one word of explanation. That is certain.”
And he gazed anxiously at the door, his ear on the alert for the least sound.