r
told me that he had gone on horseback into the town at about the hour
of Ave Maria. My grand-uncle had bidden him to go to him. The vagabond
knaves had already been put to the torture in my brother's presence, but
they had confessed nothing of their guilt; inasmuch, indeed, as in our
dungeon there were none other instruments of torture than the rack,
the thumbscrew, and scourges needful for the Bamberg torture, and a
Pomeranian cap, made to crush the head somewhat; but in Nuremberg there
was a store, less mild and of more active effect.

The air was hot and heavy, the sun had set behind black clouds, yellow
and dim, like a blind eye. A strange languor came over me, though I
was wont to be so brisk, and with it a long train of dismal and hideous
images. First I saw the Junker and Sir Franz, who had fallen out about
me, a foolish maid; then it was my Ann, pining with grief, paler than
ever with a nun's veil on her; or standing by the Pegnitz, on the very
spot where, erewhile, in the sweet Springtide, a forsaken maid had cast
herself in.

The first lightning rent the sky and the storm came up in haste,
bursting above our heads, and as the thunder roared closer and closer
after the flash I was more and more frightened. Moreover the sick child
wept piteously and waxed restless with fever and pain. By this time
all was still in the dining-hall; but when my aunt bid me let the
housekeeper take my place by the little one's bed and go to my rest, I
would not; for indeed I could in no wise have slept.

They let me have my way, and soon after midnight, seized with fresh
dread anent Herdegen, I was at the open window to let the rough wind
fan my hot head, when suddenly the hounds set up a furious barking, as
though the Forest lodge were beset on all sides by robbers. And at the
same time I saw, by the glare of the lightning, that the old lime-tree
in the midst of my aunt's herb garden was lying on the earth. This cut
me to the heart, inasmuch as this tree was dear to my uncle, having been
planted by his grandfather; and there was never a spot where his ailing
wife was so fain to be in the hot summer days as under its shadow. Aye,
and all my young life's happiness, meseemed, was like that tree-torn up
by the roots, and I gazed spellbound at the blasted lime-tree till I was
affrighted by a new horror; on the furthest rim of the sky, on the side
where the town lay, I beheld a line of light which waxed broader and
brighter till it