The long-drawn call for help from the warder’s horn, which came at the same moment, proved that the men were right.

Herr Ernst hastened out of the room just as Katterle’s shriek, “The lightning struck! the convent is burning!” rung from the upper step of the stairs.

He had already pronounced her sentence, and the sight of her roused his wrath again so vehemently that, spite of the urgent peril, he shouted to her that, whatever claimed his attention now, she certainly should not escape the most severe punishment for her shameful conduct.

Then he ordered old Endres and two of the menservants to watch the sleeping-room of his invalid wife, that in case anything should happen the helpless woman might be instantly borne to a place of safety.

Ere he himself went to the scene of the conflagration he hurried back to his daughters.

While the girls were giving him his hat and cloak he told them where the fire had broken out, and this caused another detention of the anxious master of the house, for Eva seized her shoes and stockings and, kicking her little slippers from her feet, declared that she, too, would not remain absent from the place when her dear nuns were in danger.  But her father commanded her to stay with her mother and sister, and went to the door, turning back once more on the threshold to his daughters with the anxious entreaty:  “Think of your mother!”

Another peal of thunder drowned the sound of his footsteps hurrying down the stairs.  When Els, who had watched her father from the window a short time, went back to her sister, Eva dried her eyes and cheeks, saying:  “Perhaps he is right; but whenever my heart urges me to obey any warm impulse, obstacles are put in my way.  What a weak nonentity is the daughter of an honourable Nuremberg family!”

Els heard this complaint with astonishment.  Was this her Eva, her “little saint,” who yesterday had desired nothing more ardently than with humble obedience, far from the tumult of the world, to become worthy of her Heavenly Bridegroom, and in the quiet peace of the convent raise her soul to God?  What had so changed the girl in these few hours?  Even the most worldly-minded of her friends would have taken such an impeachment ill.

But she had no time now to appeal to the conscience of her misguided sister.  Love and duty summoned her to her mother’s couch.  And then!  The child had become aware of her love, and was she, Els, who had been parted from Wolff by her own father, and yet did not mean to give him up, justified in advising her sister to cast aside her love and the hope of future happiness with and through the man to whom she had given her heart?

What miracles love wrought!  If in a single night it had transformed the devout future Bride of Heaven into an ardently loving woman, it could accomplish the impossible for her also.

While Eva was gazing out of the window Els returned to her mother.  She was still asleep and, without permitting either curiosity or longing to divert her from her duty, Els kept her place beside the couch of the beloved invalid, spite of the fire alarm which, though somewhat subdued, was heard in the room.