“From that day, Fritz, none but evil days have come upon Nideck, and better times seem to be far off.  Every year at the same day and hour the count has shuddering fits.  The malady lasts from a week to a fortnight, during which he howls and yells so frightfully that it makes a man’s blood run cold to hear him.  Then he slowly recovers his usual health.  He is still pale and weak, and moves trembling from one chair to another, starting at the least noise or movement, and fearful of his own shadow.  The young countess, the sweetest creature in the world, never leaves his side; but he cannot endure her while the fit is upon him.  He roars at her, ’Go, leave me this moment!  I have enough to endure without seeing you hanging about me!’ It is a horrible sight.  I am always close at his heels in the chase, I who sound the horn when he has killed the forest beasts; I am at the head of all his retainers, and I would give my life for his sake; yet when he is at his worst I can hardly keep off my hands from his throat, I am so horrified at the way in which he treats his beautiful daughter.”

Sperver looked dangerously wroth for a moment, clapped both his spurs to his mount, and we rode on at a hard gallop.

I had fallen into a reverie.  The cure of a complaint of this description appeared to me more than doubtful, even impossible.  It was evidently a mental disorder.  To fight against it with any hope of success it would be needful to trace it back to its origin, and this would, no doubt, be too remote for successful investigation.

All these reflections perplexed me greatly.  The old huntsman’s story, far from strengthening my hopes, only depressed me—­not a very favourable condition to insure success.  At about three we came in sight of the ancient castle of Nideck on the verge of the horizon.  In spite of the great distance we could distinguish the projecting turrets, apparently suspended from the angles of the edifice.  It was but a dim outline barely distinguishable from the blue sky, but soon the red points of the Vosges became visible.

At that moment Sperver drew in his bridle and said—­

“Fritz, we shall have to get there before night—­onward!”

But it was in vain that he spurred and lashed.  The horse stood rooted to the ground, his ears thrown back, his nostrils dilated, his sides panting, his legs firmly planted in an attitude of resistance.

“What is the matter with the beast?” cried Gideon in astonishment.  “Do you see anything, Fritz?  Surely—­”

He broke off abruptly, pointing with his whip at a dark form in the snow fifty yards off, on the slope of the hill.

“The Black Plague!” he exclaimed with a voice of distress which almost robbed me of my self-possession.

Following the indication of his outstretched whip I discerned with astonishment an aged woman crouching on the snowy ground, with her arms clasped about her knees, and so tattered that her red elbows came through her tattered sleeves.  A few ragged locks of grey hung about her long, scraggy, red, and vulture-like neck.