"You had better go for help to the inn of which you speak," Stella proposes.
"Then I should have to leave you here alone," says Rohritz, shaking his head.
"I am not afraid," she declares, with the hardihood of utter inexperience.
"But I am afraid for you; I cannot endure the thought of leaving you here alone on Sunday, when all the men about are intoxicated. One of the roughest of them might chance to pass by."
"In all probability no one will pass," says Stella. "Go as quickly as you can, that we may get away from here."
"In fact, she is right," Edgar says to himself. He turns to go, then returns once more, and, taking his mackintosh from his shoulders, wraps it about her.
He is gone. How slowly time passes when one is waiting in the dark! With monotonous force, in a kind of grand rhythmical cadence the rain pours down to the accompaniment of the swirling Save. No other sound is to be heard. Stella looks round at the horses, which she can dimly discern. One is lying, all four legs stretched out, in the mud, in the position in which artists are wont to portray horses killed on a battle-field; the other is nibbling with apparent relish at some greenery that has grown across the garden fence. From time to time a flash of lightning illumines the darkness. Stella takes out her watch to note the time by one of these momentary illuminations. It must have stopped,--no, it is actually only a quarter of an hour since Edgar's departure.
Hark! the rolling of wheels mingles with the rush of the Save and the plash of the rain. The sound of a human voice falls upon the girl's ear. She listens, delighted. Is it Rohritz? No, that is not his voice: there are several voices, suspiciously rough, peasants rolling past in a small basket-wagon, trolling some monotonous Slav melody. By a red flash of lightning the rude company is revealed, the driver mercilessly plying his whip upon the back of a very small horse, that is galloping through the mire with distended nostrils and fluttering mane.
Stella's heart beats, her boasted courage shrivels up to nothing. A few more minutes pass, and now she hears steps. Is he coming? No; the steps approach from the opposite direction, stumbling, dragging steps,--those of a drunkard.