Undine
should allow the fugitive to advance too far before him; and then again,
in his too eager rapidity, he was afraid he might somewhere overlook
and pass by her, should she be desirous of concealing herself from his
search. He had in the meantime penetrated pretty far into the valley,
and might hope soon to overtake the maiden, provided he were pursuing
the right track. The fear, indeed, that he might not as yet have gained
it, made his heart beat with more and more of anxiety. In the stormy
night which was now approaching, and which always fell more fearfully
over this valley, where would the delicate Bertalda shelter herself,
should he fail to find her? At last, while these thoughts were darting
across his mind, he saw something white glimmer through the branches on
the ascent of the mountain. He thought he recognized Bertalda’s robe;
and he directed his course towards it. But his horse refused to go
forward; he reared with a fury so uncontrollable, and his master was so
unwilling to lose a moment, that (especially as he saw the thickets were
altogether impassable on horseback) he dismounted, and, having fastened
his snorting steed to an elm, worked his way with caution through the
matted underwood. The branches, moistened by the cold drops of the
evening dew, struck against his forehead and cheeks; distant thunder
muttered from the further side of the mountains; and everything put on
so strange an appearance, that he began to feel a dread of the white
figure, which now lay at a short distance from him upon the ground.
Still, he could see distinctly that it was a female, either asleep or
in a swoon, and dressed in long white garments such as Bertalda had worn
the past day. Approaching quite near to her, he made a rustling with the
branches and a ringing with his sword; but she did not move.
“Bertalda!” he cried, at first low, then louder and louder; yet she
heard him not. At last, when he uttered the dear name with an energy yet
more powerful, a hollow echo from the mountain-summits around the valley
returned the deadened sound, “Bertalda!” Still the sleeper continued
insensible. He stooped down; but the duskiness of the valley, and the
obscurity of twilight would not allow him to distinguish her features.
While, with painful uncertainty, he was bending over her, a flash of
lightning suddenly shot across the valley. By this stream of light he
saw a frightfully distorted visage close to his own, and a hoarse voice
reached his ear:
“You enamoured swain, give me a kiss!” Huldbrand sprang upon his feet
with a cry of horror, and the hideous figure rose with him.
“Go home!” it cried, with a deep murmur: “the fiends are abroad. Go
home! or I have you!” And it stretched towards him its long white arms.
“Malicious Kuhleborn!” exclaimed the knight, with restored energy; “if
Kuhleborn you are, what business have you here?--what’s your will, you
goblin? There, take your kiss!” And in fury he struck his sword at the
form. But it vanished like vapour; and a rush of water, which wetted
him through and through, left him in no doubt with what foe he had been
engaged.
“He wishes to frighten me back from my pursuit of Bertalda,” said he to
himself. “He imagines that I shall be terrified at his senseless tricks,
and resign the poor distressed maiden to his power, so that he can wreak
his vengeance upon her at will. But that he shall not, weak spirit of
the flood! What the heart of man can do, when it exerts the full force
of its will and of its noblest powers, the poor goblin cannot fathom.”
He felt the truth of his words, and that they had inspired his heart
with fresh courage. Fortune, too, appeared to favour him; for, before
reaching his fastened steed, he distinctly heard the voice of Bertalda,
weeping not far before him, amid the roar of the thunder and the
tempest, which every moment increased. He flew swiftly towards the
sound, and found the trembling maiden, just as she was attempting to
climb the steep, hoping to escape from the dreadful darkness of this
valley. He drew near her with expressions of love; and bold and proud as
her resolution had so lately been, she now felt nothing but joy that the
man whom she so passionately loved should rescue her from this frightful
solitude, and thus call her back to the joyful life in the castle. She
followed almost unresisting, but so spent with fatigue, that the knight
was glad to bring her to his horse, which he now hastily unfastened from
the elm, in order to lift the fair wanderer upon him, and then to lead
him carefully by the reins through the uncertain shades of the valley.
But, owing to the wild apparition of Kuhleborn, the horse had become
wholly unmanageable. Rearing and wildly snorting as he was, the knight
must have used uncommon effort to mount the beast himself; to place
the trembling Bertalda upon him was impossible. They were compelled,
therefore, to return home on foot. While with one hand the knight drew
the steed after him by the bridle, he supported the tottering Bertalda
with the other. She exerted all the strengths in her power in order to
escape speedily from this vale of terrors. But weariness weighed her
down like lead; and all her limbs trembled, partly in consequence
of what she had suffered from the extreme terror which Kuhleborn had
already caused her, and partly from her present fear at the roar of the
tempest and thunder amid the mountain forest.
At last she slid from the arm of the knight; and sinking upon the moss,
she said: “Only let me lie here, my noble lord. I suffer the punishment
due to my folly; and I must perish here through faintness and dismay.”
“Never, gentle lady, will I leave you,” cried Huldbrand, vainly trying
to restrain the furious animal he was leading, for the horse was all
in a foam, and began to chafe more ungovernably than before, till the
knight was glad to keep him at such a distance from the exhausted maiden
as to save her from a new alarm. But hardly had he withdrawn five steps
with the frantic steed when she began to call after him in the most
sorrowful accents, fearful that he would actually leave her in this
horrible wilderness. He was at a loss what course to take. He would
gladly have given the enraged beast his liberty; he would have let him
rush away amid the night and exhaust his fury, had he not feared that
in this narrow defile his iron-shod hoofs might come thundering over the
very spot where Bertalda lay.
In this extreme peril and embarrassment he heard with delight the
rumbling wheels of a waggon as it came slowly descending the stony way
behind them. He called out for help; answer was returned in the deep
voice of a man, bidding them have patience, but promising assistance;
and two grey horses soon after shone through the bushes, and near them
their driver in the white frock of a carter; and next appeared a great
sheet of white linen, with which the goods he seemed to be conveying
were covered. The greys, in obedience to a shout from their master,
stood still. He came up to the knight, and aided him in checking the
fury of the foaming charger.
“I know well enough,” said he, “what is the matter with the brute.
The first time I travelled this way my horses were just as wilful and
headstrong as yours. The reason is, there is a water-spirit haunts this
valley--and a wicked wight they say he is--who takes delight in mischief
and witcheries of this sort. But I have learned a charm; and if you will
let me whisper it in your horse’s ear, he will stand just as quiet as my
silver greys there.”
“Try your luck, then, and help us as quickly as possible!” said the
impatient knight.
Upon this the waggoner drew down the head of the rearing courser close
to his own, and spoke some words in his ear. The animal instantly stood
still and subdued; only his quick panting and smoking sweat showed his
recent violence.
Huldbrand had little time to inquire by what means this had been
effected. He agreed with the man that he should take Bertalda in his
waggon, where, as he said, a quantity of soft cotton was stowed, and
he might in this way convey her to Castle Ringstetten. The knight could
accompany them on horseback. But the horse appeared to be too much
exhausted to carry his master so far. Seeing this, the man advised him
to mount the waggon with Bertalda. The horse could be attached to it
behind.
“It is down-hill,” said he, “and the load for my greys will therefore be
light.”
The knight accepted his offer, and entered the waggon with Bertalda.
The horse followed patiently after, while the waggoner, sturdy and
attentive, walked beside them.
Amid the silence and deepening obscurity of the night, the tempest
sounding more and more remote, in the comfortable feeling of their
security, a confidential conversation arose between Huldbrand and
Bertalda. He reproached her in the most flattering words for her
resentful flight. She excused herself with humility and feeling; and
from every tone of her voice it shone out, like a lamp guiding to the
beloved through night and darkness, that Huldbrand was still dear to
her. The knight felt the sense of her words rather than heard the words
themselves, and answered simply to this sense.
Then the waggoner suddenly shouted, with a startling voice: “Up,
my greys, up with your feet! Hey, now together!--show your
spirit!--remember who you are!”
The knight bent over the side of the waggon, and saw that the horses
had stepped into the midst of a foaming stream, and were, indeed, almost
swimming, while the wheels of the waggon were rushing round and flashing
like mill-wheels; and the waggoner had got on before, to avoid the swell
of the flood.
“What sort of a road is this? It leads into the middle of the stream!”
cried Huldbrand to his guide.
“Not at all, sir,” returned he, with a laugh; “it is just the contrary.
The stream is running in the middle of our road. Only look about you,
and see how all is overflowed!”
The whole valley, in fact, was in commotion, as the waters, suddenly
raised and visibly rising, swept over it.
“It is Kuhleborn, that evil water-spirit, who wishes to drown us!”
exclaimed the knight. “Have you no charm of protection against him,
friend?”
“I have one,” answered the waggoner; “but I cannot and must not make use
of it before you know who I am.”
“Is this a time for riddles?” cried the knight. “The flood is every
moment rising higher; and what does it concern ME to know who YOU are?”
“But mayhap it does concern you, though,” said the guide; “for I am
Kuhleborn.”
Thus speaking he thrust his head into the waggon, and laughed with a
distorted visage. But the waggon remained a waggon no longer; the grey
horses were horses no longer; all was transformed to foam--all sank
into the waters that rushed and hissed around them; while the
waggoner himself, rising in the form of a gigantic wave, dragged the
vainly-struggling courser under the waters, then rose again huge as a
liquid tower, swept over the heads of the floating pair, and was on the
point of burying them irrecoverably beneath it. Then the soft voice of
Undine was heard through the uproar; the moon emerged from the clouds;
and by its light Undine was seen on the heights above the valley.
She rebuked, she threatened the floods below her. The menacing and
tower-like billow vanished, muttering and murmuring; the waters gently
flowed away under the beams of the moon; while Undine, like a hovering
white dove, flew down from the hill, raised the knight and Bertalda,
and bore them to a green spot, where, by her earnest efforts, she soon
restored them and dispelled their terrors. She then assisted Bertalda
to mount the white palfrey on which she had herself been borne to the
valley; and thus all three returned homeward to Castle Ringstetten.
CHAPTER 8