denly modesty, hurt and
angered by the boldness of the man before her, who had dared to follow
her into her parents' house, she again raised her voice, this time to
call her from whom she was accustomed to seek and find help in every
situation in life.

"Els! Els!" rang up the stairs; and the next moment Els, who had already
heard Eva's first scream, sprang down the few steps to her sister's side.

One glance at the trembling girl in her nightrobe, and at the moonlight
which still bathed her in its rays, told Els what had drawn Eva to the
stairs.

The knight must have slipped into the house and found her there. She knew
him and, before Heinz had time to collect his thoughts, she said
soothingly to her sister, who threw her arms around her as though seeking
protection, "Go up to your room, child!--Help her, Katterle. I'll come
directly."

While Eva, leaning on the maid's arm, mounted the stairs with trembling
knees, Els turned to the Swiss and said in a grave, resolute tone: "If
you are worthy of your escutcheon, Sir Knight, you will not now fly like
a coward from this house across whose threshold you stole with shameful
insolence, but await me here until I return. You shall not be detained
long. But, to guard yourself and another from misinterpretation, you must
hear me."

Heinz nodded assent in silence, as if still under the spell of what he
had recently experienced. But, ere he reached the entry below, Martsche,
the old housekeeper, and Endres, the aged head packer, came towards him,
just as they had risen from their beds, the former with a petticoat flung
round her shoulders, the latter wrapped in a horse-blanket.

Eva's shriek had waked both, but Els enjoined silence on everyone and,
after telling them to go back to bed, said briefly that Eva in her
somnambulism had this time gone out into the street and been brought back
by the knight. Finally, she again said to Heinz, "Presently!" and then
went to her sister.

CHAPTER IX.

When Biberli bade farewell to his sweetheart, who gave him Eva's little
note, he had arranged to meet her again in an hour or, if his duties
detained him longer, in two; but after the "true and steadfast" fellow
left her, her heart throbbed more and more anxiously, for the wrong she
had done in acting as messenger between the young daughter of her
employers and a stranger knight was indeed hard to forgive.

Instead of waiting in the kitchen or entry for her lover's return, as sh