to seize him, and then behaved like a wounded bear. And to attack the Herr Count! You can hardly believe it, but I saw him myself, standing with the lifted candlestick. And I have to pay for the fellow's cursed behaviour. The Herr Count was very cross to-day, he would hardly speak a word to me, but he gave me a letter to bring to your reverence."
He took an envelope from his pouch and handed it to the priest. "Very well, Wolfram. Now go, and if Michael shows himself at the lodge, send him directly to me. I forbid you to maltreat him in any way until I have talked with him."
The forester left, grumbling at being obliged to postpone his punishment of the 'cursed boy,' but vowing that it should take place for all that. When Valentin was alone he opened the letter from the Count. It was brief enough:
"I wish to inform your reverence that the missing article has been found, and of course the charge of theft is proved unfounded. With regard to your protégé's conduct in behaving like a madman, even daring to make an assault upon myself, instead of defending himself and helping to explain the affair, you have doubtless heard all particulars from Wolfram, and will comprehend why I must decline all compliance with your wishes. This rude, unbridled fellow, with his savage disposition, belongs to the sphere in which he has passed his life. Wolfram is just the man to control him, and he will remain in his charge. All education would be wasted upon such a nature, and I am convinced that after what has occurred you will agree with me.
"Michael, Count Steinrück."
The priest dropped the letter and sat lost in sad thought. "Not a single word of regret for the shameful suspicion that fell upon an innocent fellow-being; nothing but contempt and condemnation. And yet the boy is bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh."
"Your reverence!" The words came from the half-opened door, and were spoken in a suppressed voice. Valentin started up and breathed a sigh of relief. "Michael! Are you here at last? Thank God!"
"I thought--you, too, would turn me off," Michael said, gently.
"I want to talk with you. Why do you keep at the door there? Come in."
The young man slowly approached. He wore the same Sunday suit which he had worn on that eventful day, but it had evidently been exposed to the wind and rain.
"I have been anxious about you," Valentin said, reproachfully. "No trace of you for forty-eight hours! Where have you been?"
"In the forest."
"And where did you pass the nights?"
"In the empty herdsman's-hut on the mountain."
"In all the storm? Why did you not go home?"
"I knew that Wolfram would attempt to beat me, and I do not mean to be beaten again. I wished to spare both him and myself what would have happened."
His answers sounded monotonous, but the old indifference had gone; there was something in Michael's whole air and bearing strange, gloomy, decided. He was very different from his former self. The priest looked at him with anxiety.
"Then you ought to have come to me. I expected you."
"I have come to your reverence, and what they have told you of me is not true. I am no thief."
"I know it. I never for an instant believed that you were, and now no suspicion rests upon you. The missing star has been found; little Countess Hertha carried it off for a plaything."
Michael stroked aside the damp curls from his brow, and his face wore a strange, hard expression. "Ah, the child with the red-gold hair and the beautiful evil eyes. It is she that I have to thank, is it?"
"The little girl is not to blame; she simply, after the fashion of spoiled children, carried off from her uncle's room what she supposed to be a plaything, and took it to her mother. You were the one at fault; you ought to have exculpated yourself calmly and sensibly, and the affair would have been immediately explained, instead of which--Michael, can it be true that you lifted your hand against Count Steinrück?"
"He called me a thief!" Michael gasped. "Oh, if you knew how he treated me! I was to confess--to return what I had not stolen. He never asked whether I were guilty or not. He would have liked to kick me out of the castle."
There was a degree of savage bitterness in the lad's words, and Valentin could understand it; he saw that his pupil had been irritated to madness. "They did you wrong," he said, "grievous wrong, but you ought not to have given way to furious passion, and the consequences of your anger will recoil heavily upon yourself. The Count is naturally indignant at what has occurred. You need no longer reckon upon his aid, he will hear nothing more of you."
"Will he not? But he shall hear from me! Once more at least."
"What do you mean? You do not propose to----?"
"Go to him! Yes, your reverence. Now that he knows to what unmerited disgrace he subjected me, he shall take it all back!"
"You propose to call Count Steinrück to account?" the priest exclaimed in dismay. "What an insane idea! You must give this up."
"No!" said Michael, in a hard, cold tone.
"Michael!"
"No, your reverence, I will not, even although you forbid my going. I choose to ask him why he called me thief."
All his thoughts revolved about this one point, the disgrace which had been heaped upon him, and which burned into his soul like red-hot iron. Valentin was at his wit's end; he saw that here his remonstrances could avail nothing, and the savage desire for revenge that was plain in this intent of the lad's filled him with dread. If Michael really carried out his plan of taking the Count to task, and if the Count should undertake to chastise the 'rough, unbridled fellow,' some terrible misfortune might ensue; it must be prevented at all hazards.
"I never thought that my words would avail so little with you," he said, sorrowfully. "Well, then, something else must appeal to you. Whether the Count has wronged you or not, it would be a crime for you to lift a finger against him; you must never--heed what I say--never confront him as a foe; he stands nearer to you than you dream."
"To me? Count Steinrück?"
"Yes. I meant to have told you hereafter of what I now reveal to you, but your insane behaviour forces me to speak. You would else be in danger of making a second assault upon--your grandfather!"
Michael started, and stood staring wide-eyed at the speaker. "My grandfather! He is----?"
"Your mother's father. But you must cherish no hopes from the tie; your mother was disinherited and cast off. Her marriage separated her forever from her family, and was her ruin."
He paused and looked at Michael, who for the moment said not a word, although it was evident that the revelation had agitated him terribly. His features worked, and his chest rose and fell as though he were labouring for breath; at last after a long pause he said, gloomily, "Go on,--is there no more to tell?"
"No, my son, no more for the present. It is a sad story, ending in grief and misery; a tissue of crime and misfortune that you could hardly understand. Hereafter, when you are older and more mature, you shall hear everything; for the present let the bare facts content you: I vouch for their truth. You see now that the person of Count Steinrück should be sacred to you."
"Sacred?
