She felt as if an icy cramp had been grasping and crushing her heart, so that no warm human blood could flow in her veins, and that now the grip was at last relaxed and the hot flood streaming into her heart again. She must go out, she must see whether Vincenz was at home, she must speak to him at once, before daybreak, she must tell him that the ghastly deed must not be done--she was in a fever, all her pulses throbbed. She had desired the deed, commanded it, but already the idea that it might have been done, extinguished her wrath--and she forgave.
She threw a neckerchief on her shoulders, and hastened across the courtyard and through the garden to Vincenz' house. What would he, what would everyone think of her? It was all one--what did it matter now?
She reached the house. There was a light in Vincenz' room on the groundfloor; noiselessly she glided up, she could see through the parted curtains--her heart stood still--the room was empty, the pine-torch almost burnt away. She went round the house; the door was unfastened, she opened it softly and went in. All was still as death, the men and maids fast asleep; she crept through the whole house, nothing stirred--Vincenz was away! The blood curdled in her veins; she went into his bedroom, the bed was disturbed--he must have laid himself down, then risen again; his Sunday clothes were hanging up, but his work-day clothes were missing, nor was his hat in its place. She looked into the sitting-room; the nail where his rifle usually hung was empty.
Wally stood as if paralysed; she never knew how she got outside the house again. At the door she dropped on to a bench; her feet would carry her no further. She tried to reassure herself: most likely, restless as he was, he had gone out after some night game--what could he do to Joseph, quietly asleep somewhere--she shivered--on a soft pillow? And by day when everyone was up and about, nobody could touch or harm him.
It was her evil conscience that pursued her with these terrors, and she hid her face in her hands. "Wally, Wally, what art thou become?" Shamed, scorned, degraded in the eyes of men, and a sinner in the eyes of God. Where was water enough to purify her? Down below, there rushed the torrent--that--yes, that would clear her from every stain; if she threw herself into that cold flood, all would be washed away, her sorrow and her guilt--the whole unblest existence created only to horror and to strife at once done away with--annihilated. Yes, that were redemption--why did she hesitate? Away with the useless shell that held the soul in fetters of guilt and suffering! She started up, but she could not move, she fell back upon the bench. Was this down-trodden, deadened spirit still held to life then by some invisible thread?
There, God be praised! a footstep on the grass. There came Vincenz. Now she could speak with him; all might yet be well.
"Saints above us!" exclaimed Vincenz, as she went forward to meet him, "is it thou?" He gazed at her as if she were a spirit. Wally saw in the morning twilight that he was pale and disturbed. His gun was on his shoulder.
"Vincenz," she said in a low voice, "hast thou shot anything?"
"Aye."
"What?" She looked at his game-bag, it was empty.