h nothing of what
she spoke, save the repetition of the words, "Home! I have no home!"--Oh,
God! she was sadly altered!

A bugle echoed among the cliffs. I bore her to a cavern, the discovery of
my youth, and wrapped her in my cloak. Hurrying, by familiar paths, with a
speed I had never before exerted, I rejoined my associates.

VII.

An intricate and circuitous track brought us at midnight to the isolated
church of St. Michael, commanding the village and the narrow road to the
castle. We crouched in the church-yard, until every sound ceased, and the
lights that had blazed in different directions were no longer visible.
Leaving part of my force to intercept the communication with the village,
I led the remainder to a point of the fortress which I had scaled in my
youthful rambles.

The pacing of the sentinels, and the noisy vigils of the count and his
guests, were clearly audible as I descended the ivied wall. My party
followed, one by one, and our success would have been signally complete,
but for the accidental discharge of a musket. This was answered by a
volley from the guard, the din of arms, and the hasty gathering of a
tumultuous body of defenders. Ordering my men to keep close and follow me,
we pressed forward to a private door that opened into the body of the
pile.

This barrier was quickly shattered by a shower of balls, and in a second
the great hall resounded with the groans of the dying and the shouts of
the triumphant. In that arena of slaughter I was collected as I am now.
Once had Rainer's bloated visage confronted me in the fray, but the
baleful meteor vanished, and bootless to me was the issue of the conflict,
until blade or bullet did its work on him and his subordinate.

The hall gave indications of a carousal. The red wine streaming from
flagons overturned in struggle, mingled with the life-drops of the
wassailers. Death derived a more appalling aspect from the relics of
recent revelry. Some intoxicated wretches had been bayoneted with the
goblets in their hands. One had fallen backward on the hearth above the
burning embers; he was mortally wounded, and the blood gushed freely in
the flames. I stooped to raise him from his bed of torture. The streaks of
gore did not disguise the lineaments of Ludolf. The reprobate had closed
his reckoning with mortality.

Victory was ours, but discipline was at an end; I could with difficulty
muster sentinels for the night; the cellars were ransacke