le casement and hearing Katte bleat. Where
were her poor twin lambs? The night was bitterly cold, for it was
already far on in autumn; the river had swollen and flooded many fields;
the snow for the last week had fallen quite low down on the
mountain-sides. Even if still living the little lambs would die, out on
such a night without the mother or food and shelter of any sort.
Findelkind, whose vivid brain always saw everything that he imagined as
if it were being acted before his eyes, in fancy saw his two dear lambs
floating dead down the swollen tide, entangled in rushes on the flooded
shore, or fallen with broken limbs upon a crest of rocks. He saw them so
plainly that scarcely could he hold back his breath from screaming aloud
in the still night and arousing the mourning wail of the desolate
mother.

At last he could bear it no longer: his head burned, and his brain
seemed whirling round. At a bound he leaped out of bed quite
noiselessly, slid into his sheepskins, and stole out as he had done the
night before, hardly knowing what he did. Poor Katte was mourning in the
wooden shed with the other sheep, and the wail of her sorrow sounded
sadly across the loud roar of the rushing river. The moon was still
high. Above, against the sky, black and awful with clouds floating over
its summit, was the great Martinswand.

Findelkind this time called the big dog Waldmar to him, and with the dog
beside him went once more out into the cold and the gloom, whilst his
father and mother, his brothers and sisters, were sleeping, and poor
childless Katte alone was awake. He looked up at the mountain, and then
across the water-swept meadows to the river. He was in doubt which way
to take. Then he thought that in all likelihood the lambs would have
been seen if they had wandered the river-way, and even little Stefan
would have had too much sense to let them go there. So he crossed the
road and began to climb Martinswand. With the instinct of the born
mountaineer he had brought out his crampons with him, and had now
fastened them on his feet: he knew every part and ridge of the
mountains, and had more than once climbed over to that very spot where
Kaiser Max had hung in peril of his life.

On second thoughts he bade Waldmar go back to the house. The dog was a
clever mountaineer too, but Findelkind did not wish to lead him into
danger. "I have done the wrong, and I will bear the brunt," he said to
himself; for he felt as if he had kill