he need not trouble more about him. But the news of his
brother's survival reached him, nevertheless. Now all those I had loved
so passionately had gone away, and I felt it very deeply. There the
castle stood, sad and lifeless, and its lighted windows looked down no
more upon us from the height. All its eyes were closed and were to
remain so."

"Oh, oh, did they never come back?" cried out Kurt with regret.

"No, never," the mother replied. "At that time, too, apparently, all the
reports which had long ago faded were revived as to a ghost who was
supposed to wander about the castle. There were many who asserted they
had seen or heard him, and till to-day the ghost of Wildenstein is
haunting people's heads."

"Look at him," said Bruno dryly, pointing to the lower end of the table
where Kurt was sitting.

"Finish, please, mother," the latter quickly urged. "Where did they all
get to? And where is the brother who disappeared?"

"All I still have to tell you is short and sad," said the mother.
"Leonore faithfully wrote to me. After spending the first winter in the
south it became apparent that the Baroness's health was shattered. She
refused to return to the castle and sent her instructions to Apollonie,
who had married the gardener of Wildenstein, and who now with her husband
became caretaker of the castle, Three years afterwards the Baroness died
without ever having returned. A short time after that Leonore became
Salo's wife, but they were not fated to remain together long. Not more
than three years later Salo died of a violent fever and Leonore followed
him in a few months, but they left a little boy and a little girl. After
Salo's death Leonore was left alone in life, so an aunt from Holstein
came to live with her in Nice. After Leonore's death this aunt took the
two children home with her. I heard this from Apollonie, who had been
sent Leonore's last instructions by this aunt. I never learned anything
further about the two children, and only once did I receive word from
Baron Bruno through Apollonie. Your late father, young Rector Bergmann,
had married me just about the time when we heard of the Baroness's death.
I followed him very gladly to Sils, because Philip had just bought an
estate there and was very anxious to have me close to him. One day
Apollonie came to me in great agitation. Baron Bruno, never once sending
word, had arrived in the castle after an absence of eight years and had
brought with him a comp