Just as he had finished, a terrific racket of drums and trumpets, horns and clarionets, was suddenly heard in the shrubbery; guns were fired at intervals, loud cheers were given, the little girls began to dance again, and heads appeared among the bushes as if they had grown out of the earth. I ran and leaped about in all the hurry and scurry, but as it began to grow dark I only gradually recognized all the faces. The old gardener beat the drum, the students from Prague in their cloaks played away, and among them the Porter fingered his bassoon like mad. When I suddenly perceived him thus unexpectedly, I ran to him and embraced him with enthusiasm, causing him to play quite out of time. "Upon my word, if he should travel to the ends of the earth he would never be anything but a goose!" he said to the students, and then went on blowing away at his bassoon in a fury.
Meanwhile, the lovely Lady fair had privately escaped from all the noise and confusion, and had fled like a startled fawn far into the depths of the garden.
I caught sight of her in time and hurried after her. In their zeal the musicians never noticed us; after a while they thought that we had decamped to the castle, and then the entire band took up the line of march in that direction.
We, however, almost at the same moment reached a summer-house on the borders of the garden, whence through the open window there was a view of the wide, deep valley. The sun had long since set behind the mountains, a rosy haze glimmered in the warm fading twilight, through which the murmur of the Danube ascended clearer and clearer the stiller grew the air. I looked long at the lovely Countess, who stood before me heated with her flight and so close that I could almost hear her heart beat. Now that I was alone with her I could find no words to speak, so great was my awe of her. At last I took heart of grace, and clasped in mine one of her little white hands--and in one moment her head lay on my breast and my arms were around her.
In an instant she extricated herself and turned to the window to cool her glowing cheeks in the evening air. "Ah," I cried, "my heart is full to bursting, but it all seems like a dream to me!" "And to me too," said the lovely Lady fair. "When, last summer," she went on after a while, "I came back with the Countess from Rome where we fortunately found Fräulein Flora, and had brought her back with us but could hear nothing of you either there or here, I never thought all this would come to pass. It was only at noon today that Jocky, the good, brisk fellow, came breathless into the court-yard and brought the news that you had come by the mail-boat." Then she laughed quietly to herself. "Do you remember," she said, "that time when I came out on the balcony? It was just such an evening as this, and there was music in the garden." "And he is really dead?" I asked hastily. "Whom do you mean?" replied the Lady fair, looking at me in surprise. "Your ladyship's husband," said I, "who was with you on the balcony." She flushed crimson. "What strange fancies you have in your head!" she exclaimed. "That was the Countess's son, who had just returned from his travels, and, since it happened to be my birthday, he led me out on the balcony with him that I might have a share of the cheers. Was that why you ran away?" "Good heavens, yes!" I cried, striking my forehead with my hand. She shook her head and laughed merrily.