For nearly half an hour the little group pressed forward in a direction
exactly opposite to the one by which Gerald had come to the village.
Danira led the way and the others followed, but scarcely a word was
exchanged, for all three had great difficulty in breasting the storm,
which grew more violent every moment.
Yet this tempest was not like those that raged in the mountains of
their native Tyrol, with hurrying clouds, mists, and showers of rain
that wrapped the earth in their veil, where the forests shuddered and
trembled, and the uproar of the elements seemed to transform all nature
into chaos. Here no cloud dimmed the clear azure of the sky, in which
the stars were shining brightly, and the moonlight rested clear and
radiant on the rocky heights, stretching into infinite distance, rugged
and cleft into a thousand rifts that intersected them in every
direction; but the white moonbeams and the deep black shadows of the
chasms everywhere revealed the same desolation.
Here no forest rustled, no reed quivered in the wind. The hurricane
roared over the earth as if the spirits of destruction had been let
loose and were now sweeping on in search of their prey, but its might
was baffled by the cold, lifeless stone that could neither be stirred
nor shaken.
There was something uncanny and terrible in this rigid repose amidst
the fierce raging of the tempest, it seemed as though all nature was
spell-bound in a death-slumber which nothing could break. Wildly as the
_bora_ raved, the earth made no response, it remained under the icy
ban.
Again the trio pressed on through hurricane and moonlight, still
farther into the wilderness. It seemed to the men as though they must
long since have lost their way and there was no escape from this desert
where one ridge rose beyond another in perpetual, horrible monotony,
but Danira walked on undisturbed without once hesitating. At last she
stopped and turned.
"We have reached our goal," she said, pointing down into the depths
below. "There is the Vila spring."
Gerald paused to take breath, and his eyes wandered in the direction
indicated. The ground suddenly sloped sheer down and he saw at his feet
a chasm, close by a huge, projecting rock. It was a strange formation
of stone, towering upward in broad massive outlines, curiously jagged
at the top, the peak inclined so far forward that it looked as if it
must break off and fall. Beyond this gateway the ravine appeared to
widen, for they saw the moonlight glitter on some rippling water.
"Must we go down there?" George asked his lieutenant, doubtfully, in a
low tone. "The rock hangs over like one of our bunches of ripe grapes
at home. I believe it will drop on our heads as soon as we come near
it. Everything in Krivoscia is spiteful, even the stones."
"The rock will not fall," replied Danira, who had heard the words, "it
has hung so for centuries, and no storm has ever shaken it. Follow us."
She had already descended and Gerald followed without hesitation. They
both passed the rock gateway and George could not help joining them. He
cast one more suspicious glance upward; for he had become accustomed to
regard everything in this country as a personal foe, but the rocky
peak, by way of exception, showed no disposition to molest him, and
remained quietly in its threatening attitude.
The distance was not very great. In a few minutes both reached the
bottom of the cliffs and stood in a ravine which widened rapidly above,
but was accessible only through the rock gateway. Here too flowed the
water they had seen above, one of the little streams which often burst
suddenly out of the rocky soil of the Karst and in a short time as
suddenly vanish again. Even here the water preserved its beneficent
power, for fresh grass was growing around it, thin and scanty, it is
true, but a sign of life amid this petrified nature, and there was life
also in the clear waves which, with a low ripple and murmur, made a
channel down the ravine.
Danira, with a sigh of relief, leaned against the cliff. The exhaustion
of the rapid walk or excitement had made the girl tremble from head to
foot, and she really seemed to need the support.
"We have reached the spot," she said, softly. "Here you are safe."
Gerald, who meantime had scanned the surroundings, shook his head
doubtfully.
"The safety will last only until our place of refuge is discovered, and
that will soon be done. Obrevic knows every defile as well as you, as
soon as he has searched the village he will follow on our track without
delay."
"Certainly. But he will halt before that rock gateway, he will not
enter the precincts of the Vila spring, for then he would be obliged to
give you his hand in friendship; that hand cannot be raised against you
here. Fierce and revengeful as Marco may be, even he will not dare to
break the spell of peace that rests upon this spot."
The young officer started and again cast a searching glance around the
ravine.
"So that is why you brought us here? But what protects this place which
is to shield us?"
"I do not know. Legend, tradition, superstition probably wove the spell
centuries ago--enough that the charm still exists in all its ancient
power. Even in my childhood I knew of the Vila spring and its spell of
peace. Afterward, when far away, the memory sometimes came back to me
like a half-forgotten legend that belonged to the realm of fairy-land.
Since my return I have known that the tale contains a saving truth. The
spring is more sacred than the threshold of any church. Here even the
murderer, the betrayer is safe. Here, the vendetta itself, that
terrible family law of our people, must pause. No one has yet dared to
violate the charm, and if any one tried it, he would be outlawed by all
the members of the tribe."
"And you believe that this spell will guard even the foreigner, the
foe?"
"Yes."
The answer was so firm that Gerald made no objection, though he doubted
it.
"One mystery more in this mysterious land!" he said, slowly. "We will
wait to see how it will be solved for us. We were treacherously lured
into an ambush, and stand alone against a horde of enemies, so it will
be no cowardice to trust ourselves to such protection."
He looked around him for George, who had instantly taken the practical
side of the affair, and carefully and thoroughly searched the whole
ravine. Finding nothing suspicious, he had climbed a large boulder, and
stationed himself at a point from which he could watch at the same time
the entrance and his lieutenant, for he still dreaded some piece of
witchcraft from Danira. Unfortunately, he could not hear what was
passing between the pair. The wind was blowing too violently; but he
could at least keep them in view. So he stood at his post firm and
fearless, ready to defend himself like a man and a soldier against any
intruding foe, and at the same time come to his lieutenant's aid with
his whole stock of Christianity in case the latter should be
treacherously seized by the Evil One from behind--the brave fellow
feared neither death nor devil.
Gerald had approached Danira, who still leaned against the cliff, but
she drew back. The mute gesture was so resolute in its denial that he
dared not advance nearer. The deliverance she had bestowed only seemed
to have raised one more barrier between them. He felt this, and fixed a
reproachful glance upon her as he retired.
Danira either did not or would not see it, although the moonlight
clearly illumined the features of both. Hastily, as though to
anticipate any warmer words, she asked:
"Where are your men?"
"At the fort. We returned there after the expedition of the morning,
and the troops to whom we brought assistance with us."
"And nothing is known of your danger?
"On the contrary, I am supposed to be in perfect safety. The shameful
plot was so cleverly devised. A dying comrade, who wished to place a
last commission in my hands, his portfolio as a credential. The village
we all thought still occupied by our men named. Obrevic was cautious
enough, though it would have been more manly to have sought me in open
battle, I certainly did not shun him. He preferred to act like an
assassin, though he calls himself a warrior and a chief."
Danira's brow darkened, but she gently shook her head.
"You reckon with your ideas of honor. Here it is different, only the
act is important; no account is taken of the means. Joan Obrevic fell
by your hand, and his son must avenge him; that is the law of the race.
How, Marco does not ask; he knows but one purpose, the destruction of
his foe; and, if he cannot accomplish it in open warfare, he resorts to
stratagem. I heard the vow he made when we entered our native mountains
on the morning after his escape, and he will fulfil it, though it
should bring destruction on his own head. That is why you are safe here
only for the time. I know Marco, and while he will not dare to approach
the Vila spring, he will guard the entrance, actually besiege you here
until desperation urges you to some reckless step by which you will
fall into his hands. Your comrades must be informed at any cost."
"That is impossible! Who should, who could carry such a message?"
"I!"
"What, you would----"
"I will do nothing by halves, and your rescue is but half accomplished
if no aid comes from without. But I must wait till Marco has reached
the village; he will search every hut, examine every stone in it, and
meanwhile I shall gain time to go."
"Never!" cried Gerald. "I will not permit it. You might meet Obrevic,
and I, too, know him. If he should guess--nay, even suspect, your
design, he would kill you."
"Certainly he would!" said Danira, coldly. "And he would do right."
"Danira!"
"If Marco punished treason with death he would be in the right, and I
should not flinch from the blow. I am calling the foe to the aid of a
foe; that is treason; I know it."
"Then why do you save me at such a price?" asked the young officer,
fixing his eyes intently upon her.
"Because I must."
The words did not sound submissive but harsh. They contained a sullen
rebellion against the power which had fettered not only the girl's will
but her whole nature, and which enraged her even while she yielded to
it. She had brought the foreigner, the foe, to the sacred spring,
although she knew that such a rescue would be considered treachery and
desecration; she was ready to sacrifice everything for him, yet at the
same moment turned almost with hatred from him and his love.
The _bora_ could not penetrate the depths of the ravine, but it raged
all the more fiercely on the upper heights, roaring around the peaks as
if it would hurl them downward. Old legends relate that, on such
tempestuous nights, the spirits of all the murdered men whose blood has
ever reddened the earth are abroad, and it really seemed as though
spectral armies were fighting in the air and sweeping madly onward.
Sometimes it sounded as if thousands of voices, jeering, threatening,
hissing, blended in one confused medley, till at last all united with
the raving and howling into a fierce melody, a song of triumph, which
celebrated only destruction and ruin.
What else could have been its theme in this land where the people were
as rigid and pitiless as the nature that surrounded them? Here conflict
was the sole deliverance. A fierce defiance of all control, even that
of law and morals, a bloody strife, and humiliating defeat. So it had
been from the beginning, so it was now, and if the legendary ghosts
were really sweeping by on the wings of the blast, they were still
fighting, even in death.
Yet amid this world of battle, the Vila spring cast its spell of peace.
Whence it came, who had uttered it, no one knew. The origin was lost in
the dim shadows of the past, but the pledge was kept with the
inviolable fidelity with which all uncultured races cling to their
traditions. Perhaps it was an instinct of the people that had formerly
erected this barrier against their own arbitrary will and fierceness,
and guarded at least one spot of peace--be that as it may, the place
was guarded, and the rude sons of the mountains bowed reverently to the
enchanted precinct, whose spell no hostile deed had ever violated.
The moon was now high in the heavens, and her light poured full into
the ravine.
The bluish, spectral radiance streamed upon the dark cliffs and wove a
silvery veil upon the clear waters of the spring, which flowed on
untroubled by all the raging of the tempest. Above were storm and
strife, and here below, under the shelter of the towering rocks, naught
save a faint murmuring and rippling that seemed to whisper a warning to
give up conflict and make peace beside the spring of peace.
"You must!" said Gerald, repeating Danira's last words. "And I too
must. I too have struggled and striven against a power that fettered my
will, but I no longer hate that power as you do. Why should we keep
this useless barrier of hostility between us; we both know that it will
not stand; we have tried it long enough. I heard the cry that escaped
your lips when I so unexpectedly crossed the threshold of your house.
It was my own name, and the tone was very different from that hard,
stern, 'I must.'"
Danira made no reply; she had turned away, yet could not escape his
voice, his eyes. The low, half choked utterance forced a way to her
heart; in vain she pressed both hands upon it. That voice found
admittance, and she heard it amid all the raging of the storm.
"From the day I entered your mountain home one image stood before my
soul, one thought filled it--to see you again, Danira! I knew we must
meet some day. Why did you leave me that message? You would not take my
contempt with you, though you defied the opinion of every one else. The
words haunted me day and night! I could not forget them, they decided
my destiny."
"It was a message of farewell," the young girl murmured in a half
stifled tone. "I never expected to see you again, and I gave it to your
promised wife."
"Edith is no longer betrothed to me," said the young officer, in a
hollow tone.
Danira started in sudden, terror-stricken surprise.
"No longer betrothed to you? For heaven's sake, what has happened? You
have severed the tie."
"No, Edith did it, and for the first time I realize how entirely she
was in the right. Those laughing, untroubled, childish eyes gazed deep
into my heart; they guessed what at that time I myself did not, or
would not know. True, her father left me the option of returning if I
could conquer the 'dream.' I could not, and now--by all that is sacred
to me--I no longer wish to do so. What is the reality, the happiness of
a whole life, compared with the dream of this moment, for which,
perhaps, I must sacrifice existence? But I no longer complain of the
stratagem that lured me here; it gave me this meeting, a meeting not
too dearly purchased by the mortal peril that now surrounds me, nay, by
death itself."
It was really Gerald von Steinach whose lips uttered these words,
Gerald von Steinach, the cool, circumspect man with the icy eyes, who
could not love.
They now flowed in a fiery stream from his lips and kindled a
responsive flame in Danira's soul. Her strength could no longer hold
out against this language of passion, and when Gerald approached her a
second time, she did not shrink from him, though the hand he clasped
trembled in his.
"Perhaps I may bring you death!" she said softly, but with deep sorrow.
"It is my destiny to cause misfortune everywhere. Had I left Cattaro
even a few weeks earlier, we should never have seen each other and you
would have been happy by Edith's side. I know she merely entrenched
herself behind caprices and obstinacy; her heart belongs to the man who
was destined to be her husband. It is the first true, deep feeling of
her life, the awakening from the dream of childhood. She is now
experiencing her first bitter grief--through me. And yet she is the
only creature I have ever loved."
She tried to withdraw her hand, but in vain. He would not release it,
and only bent toward her, so close that his breath fanned her cheek.
"The only creature? Danira, shall not even this hour bring us truth?
Who knows how short may be the span of life allotted to me? I do not
believe Obrevic's fierceness and thirst for vengeance will be stayed by
this spot, and am prepared to fall a victim to his fury. But I must
once more hear my name from your lips as you uttered it just now. You
must not refuse that request. If, even now, in the presence of death,
they sternly withhold the confession of love, be it so, I will not ask
it--but you must call me what my mother calls me--you must say this
once: 'Gerald.'"
His voice trembled with passionate entreaty. It seemed vain, for Danira
remained silent and motionless a few seconds longer. At last she slowly
turned her face to his, and gazing deep into his eyes, said:
"Gerald!"
It was only one word, yet it contained all--the confession so ardently
desired, the most absolute devotion, the cry of happiness, and with an
exclamation of rapturous joy Gerald clasped the woman he loved to his
breast.
The storm raged above them, and mortal peril waved dark wings over
their heads; but amid the tempest and the shadow of death a happiness
was unfolded which swallowed up every memory of the past, every thought
of the future. Gerald and Danira no longer heeded life or death, and
had a bloody end confronted them at that moment they would have faced
it with radiant joy in their hearts.
"I thank you!" said Gerald, fervently, but without releasing the girl
from his embrace. "Now, come what may, I am prepared."
The words recalled Danira to the reality of their situation; she
started.
"You are right, we must meet what is coming; I must go."
"Go! At the moment we have found each other? And am I to let you face a
peril I cannot share?"
Danira gently but firmly released herself from his arms.
"You are in danger, Gerald, not I, for I know every path of my
'mountain home,' and shall avoid Marco, who has now had time to reach
the village. Have no fear, your safety is at stake, I will be cautious.
Yet, before I go, promise me not to leave the Vila spring; let no
stratagem, no threat lure you away. Here alone can you and your
companion find safety and deliverance, one step beyond that rock
gateway and you will be lost."
The young officer gazed anxiously and irresolutely at the speaker.
True, he told himself that she would be safe; even if she met his
pursuers no one would suspect whence she came or where she was going,
and a pretext was easily found. If she remained with him she must share
his fate and perhaps be the first victim of her tribe's revenge, yet it
was unspeakably difficult for him to part from the happiness he had
scarcely won.
"I will not leave the spring," he answered. "Do you think I want to die
now? I never so loved life as at this moment when my Danira is its
prize, and I am ready to fight for it--I shall be fighting for my
happiness and future."
His glance again sought hers, which no longer shunned it, but the large
dark eyes rested on his features with a strange expression--a look at
once gentle, yet gloomy and fraught with pain; it had not a ray of the
happiness so brightly evident in his words.
"The price[1] of your life!" she repeated. "Yes, Gerald, I will be that
with my whole heart, and now--farewell!"
"Farewell! God grant that you may reach the fort safely; once there my
comrades will know how to protect my preserver from the vengeance of
her people."
He spoke unsuspiciously and tenderly, but he must have unwittingly
stirred those dark depths in the girl's nature, which were mysterious
even to him. Danira started as though an insult had been hurled in her
face; the old fierceness seemed about to break forth again, but it was
only a moment ere the emotion was suppressed.
"I need their protection as little as I fear the vengeance directed
against myself alone! Farewell, Gerald; once more--farewell!"
The young officer again clasped her in his arms. He did not hear the
pain of parting in the words, only the deep, devoted love, still so new
to him from Danira. But she scarcely allowed him a moment for his
leave-taking, but tore herself away, as if she feared to prolong it.
He saw her bend over the spring, while her lips moved as though she
were commending her lover to its protection. Then she hastily climbed
the cliff, and vanished through the dark rock gateway.
At the top of the height Danira paused. Only one moment's rest after
this mute, torturing conflict! She alone knew what this parting meant.
Gerald did not suspect that it was an eternal farewell, or he never
would have permitted her to quit his side.
In spite of all, he did not know Danira Hersovac. She had, it is true,
become a stranger to her people, out of harmony with all their customs
and opinions, while her own thoughts and feelings were in the camp of
the foe from whom she had once so defiantly fled, but the mighty,
viewless tie of blood still asserted its power, and called what she was
in the act of doing by the terrible name, treason.
She was going to summon the foreign troops to Gerald's aid, and if
Marco held out--and hold out he would--blood would be shed for the sake
of one who should not, must not die, though his rescue should cost the
highest price.
From the moment Danira knew that this rescue was solely in her hands
she no longer had a choice. Save him she must! It was a necessity to
which she helplessly bowed, but to live on with the memory of what had
happened and be happy by her lover's side--the thought did not enter
the girl's mind.
The dead chief's daughter might commit the treason, but she could also
expiate it. When Gerald was once rescued and in safety, she would go
back to her brother and Marco, the head of the tribe, and confess what
she had done. The traitress would meet death, she knew--so much the
better. Then the perpetual discord between her birth and her education
would be forever ended.
She cast one more glance into the ravine, where the water of the Vila
spring was shimmering in the moonlight. Mysteriously born of the rocky
soil, it appeared but once, gazed but once at the light to vanish again
in subterranean chasms, yet its short course was a blessing to every
one who approached it. Here, too, it had bestowed a brief, momentary
happiness, which had only glittered once and must now end in separation
and death; yet it outweighed a whole existence.
The invisible hosts were still contending in the air, their jeering,
threatening voices still blended in the fierce chant of destruction and
ruin. Danira was familiar with the legends of her home, and understood
the menace of the tempest. She raised her head haughtily as if in
answer.
"Vain! I will not let myself be stopped! If I commit the treason, I
have pronounced my own doom, and Marco will pitilessly execute it. God
himself would need to descend from heaven to secure my pardon. You
shall be saved, Gerald; I will be what I promised--the price of your
life!"
She hurried onward through the storm-swept, moonlit waste of rocks--to
the rescue.