nocking at the door, and the voice of Dame
Zudar inquired:

"I say, Betsey! is your father asleep?"

"Yes," stammered the little girl.

"Some people have come hither from Kassa, they don't understand German,
come out and speak to them!"

The little maid hastily put on her clothes and, opening the fast-locked
door, went out into the kitchen.

* * * * *

Peter Zudar was continually tormented by evil dreams. Danger to Elise
was the ever-recurring subject of his nightmares. Now he saw her
wandering among rocks overhanging dizzy abysses, and would have
stretched out his hand to lay hold of her and draw her back, but his
hand could not reach her. Now a fierce wolf was pursuing the child, and
he would have run after it with a gun, but his legs refused their
service, or he forgot where the gun was, or it refused to go off.

Suddenly a shrill scream sounded in his ear.

"Father!"

Up he jumped. That cry had pierced through his heart, through every
fibre of his body. It was Elise who was calling.

"Elise! Elise, my child! are you asleep? Were you calling just now?" he
inquired softly.

Receiving no answer he turned towards the child's bed, which lay at the
foot of his own, and sought for her little head on the pillow with his
hand.

She was not there.

The same instant he heard the key of his room-door turning in the lock
outside.

With one bound he was at the door. Not a word did he say, but he shook
the door till it trembled on its hinges.

At that moment he heard hasty footsteps quitting the kitchen and the
hall, and once more imagined he could distinguish Elise's stifled moans.

Redoubled fury lent gigantic strength to his Sampsonian frame. The door
burst into two pieces beneath the pressure of his hands, and the upper
portion containing the lock remained in his clenched fist.

He roared aloud for the first time as he rushed into the kitchen. It was
no human voice, no intelligible sound, but the roar of a savage lion
whose den has been broken into, and who scents the flesh of the
huntsman.

And in response to this savage roar there arose from the courtyard the
mocking yell of hundreds and hundreds of human voices, intermingled with
laughter, curses, and threats.

For a moment he remained there dumfounded. What could it be? Surely not
a band of robbers in collusion with his wife?

"Look out!" cried the shrill voice of Dame Zudar rising above the din
outside, "the old c