On one occasion he returned from the bridge, and without lighting the lamp, sat on the arm of my chair.  The moonlight streaming through the window illumined his head as with a halo.  He tossed the damp curls from his face, and his eyes were aglow with joy.  There was no need to tell me what had happened, but he told me.

“Ah, Karl, I’ve seen the star,” he cried triumphantly.  He was but a boy-man, you must remember.

“I was sure you would see her,” I answered.  “How did you bring the meeting about?”

“I did not bring it about,” he answered, laughing softly.  “The star came to the child.”

“All things come to him that waits at the bridge,” I replied sarcastically.  He paid no heed to the sarcasm, but continued:—­

“She happened to be near the bridge when I got there, and she came to me, Karl,—­she came to me like a real star falling out of the darkness.”

That little fact solved once more my great riddle—­at least, it solved it for a time.  Yolanda was not Mary of Burgundy.  I had little knowledge of princesses and their ways, but I felt sure they were not in the habit of lurking in dark places or wandering by sluggish moats in the black shadow of a grim castle.  A princess would not and could not have been loitering by the bridge near the House under the Wall.  Castleman’s words concerning Yolanda’s residence under his roof came back and convinced me that my absurd theory concerning her identity was the dream of a madman.

“She happened to be near the bridge?” I asked, with significant emphasis.

“Perhaps I should not have used the word ‘happened,’” returned Max.

“I thought as much.  What did she have to say for herself, Max?”

“If I were not sure of your devotion, Karl, I should not answer a question concerning Yolanda put in such a manner,” he replied; “but I’ll tell you.  When I stepped on the bridge, she came running to me from the shadow of the trees.  Her arms were uplifted, and she moved so swiftly and with such grace one could almost think she was flying—­”

“Witches fly,” I interrupted.  My remark checked his flow of enthusiasm.  After a long silence I queried, “Well?”

Max began again.

“She gave me her hand and said:  ’I knew you would come again, Sir Max.  I saw you from the battlements last night and the night before and the night before that.  I could not, with certainty, recognize you from so great a distance, but I was sure you would come to the bridge—­I do not know why, but I was sure you would come; so to-night I too came.  You cannot know the trouble I took or the risk I ran in coming.  You have not seen me for many days, yet you remember me and have come five times to the bridge.  I was wrong when I said you would forget the burgher girl within a fortnight.  Sir Max, you are a marvel of constancy.’  At that moment the figures of two men appeared on the castle battlements, silhouetted against the moon; they seemed of enormous stature, magnified in the moonlight.  One of them was the Duke of Burgundy.  I recognized him by his great beard, of which I have heard you speak.  Yolanda caught one glimpse of the men and ran back to the house without so much as giving me a word of farewell.”