How he loved her!  How intense was the longing which drew him after her!  And yet another emotion stirred in his heart with still greater power-grief, sincere grief, which pierced his in, most soul, that she could have beckoned to him, permitted him to follow her, granted him what he would never have ventured to ask.  Nay, when he set his foot on the first step, it seemed as if the temple which contained his holiest treasure fell crashing around him, and an inner voice cried loudly:  “Away, away from here!  Would you exchange the purest and loftiest things for what tomorrow will fill you with grief and loathing?” it continued to admonish.  “You will relinquish what is dearest and most sacred to secure what is ready to rush into your arms on all the high-roads.

“Hence, hence, you poor, deluded mortal, ere it is too late!”

But even had he known it was the fair fiend Venus herself moving before him under the guise of Eva, the spell of her unutterable beauty would have constrained him to follow her, though the goal were the Horselberg, death, and hell.

On the second landing she again stood still and, leaning against a pillar, raised her arms and extended them towards the moon, in whose silvery light they gleamed like marble.  Heinz saw her lips move, heard his own name fall from them, and all self-control vanished.

“Eva!” he cried with passionate fervor, holding out his arms to clasp her; but, ere he even touched her, a shriek of despairing anguish echoed loudly back from the walls.

The sound of her own name had broken the threads with which the mysterious power of the moonlight had drawn her from her couch, down through the house, out of doors, and again back to the stairs.

Sleep vanished with the dream which she had shared with him and, shuddering, she perceived where she was, saw the knight before her, became conscious that she had left her chamber in her night-robe, with disordered hair and bare feet; and, frantic with horror at the thought of the resistless might with which a mysterious force constrained her to obey it against her own will, deeply wounded by the painful feeling that she had been led so far across the bounds of maidenly 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.”