Her return to consciousness seemed to please him, and he showed himself
to be a kind, experienced leech. With tireless solicitude he strove to
cure the numerous injuries which she had received, and she soon learned
through him and the nun, that she had fallen from the rope and escaped
death as if by a miracle. The triumphal arch under her, and the garlands
which decorated the wooden structure, had caught her before she touched
the pavement. True, her right leg was broken, and it had been necessary
to amputate her left foot in order to save her life. Many a wound and
slash on her breast and head also needed healing, and her greatest
ornament, her long, thick, dark hair, had been cut off.

Why had they called her, the ropedancer, back to a life which
henceforward could offer her nothing save want and cruel suffering? She
uttered this reproach to her preservers very indignantly; but as the
physician saw her eating a bunch of grapes with much enjoyment, he asked
if this pleasure did not suffice to make her rejoice over the
preservation of her existence. There were a thousand similar gifts of
God, which scarcely seemed worthy of notice, yet in the aggregate
outweighed a great sorrow which, moreover, habit daily diminished.

The Sister tried, by other arguments, to reconcile her to the life which
had been preserved, but the words her devout heart inspired and which
were intended for a pious soul, produced little influence upon the
neglected child of the highroad. Kuni felt most deeply the reference to
the sorely afflicted Mother of God. If such sorrow had been sent to the
noblest and purest of mortals, through whom God had deigned to give his
divine Son to the world, what grief could be too great for her, the
wandering vagabond? She often silently repeated this to herself; yet only
too frequently her impetuous heart rebelled against the misery which she
felt that she would encounter. But many weeks were to pass before she
recovered; a severe relapse again endangered her life.

During the first days of illness she had talked to Lienhard in her
fevered visions, called him by name, and warned him against the spiteful
elf who would ruin him. Frequently, too, oaths and horrible, coarse
imprecations, such as are heard only from the mouths of the vagrants
among whom she had grown to womanhood, fell from her burning lips. When
she improved, the leech asked in the jesting tone which elderly men are
fond of using to young women whose