Now at last, after about all who had been assembled had gone, could Lambert leave Nicolas Herkimer, who said: "I will keep you no longer now. I will ride over to-morrow, as there are yet many things about which I want to talk to you." Lambert had not improperly pressed to go. As he reached the other side he found the Eisenlords, the Teicherts and a dozen others who all, with a glass of Hans Haberkorn's genuine, were discussing what they had heard and decided upon. He shook hands with them and hastened on, Fritz Volz calling after him that he would see him in the evening. As now he gave loose rein to his horse he cast an anxious, inquiring glance at the sky, in which the sun had nearly run its course. It was perhaps yet half an hour to its setting. On his left the level fields and marshes shimmered and glimmered in red, blended lights, so that he could hardly distinguish the shingled roofs of the houses; and the forms of riders and footmen appeared now and then as dark points in the sea of fire. To the right, where the farther he went the nearer did the hills and rocks press toward him, the mighty trunks of the giant pines glowed in dark purple, and their branching tops blazed in green-golden flames to the cloudless sky. With every hoof-beat of the horse the sun sunk deeper, and Lambert had just left Bellinger's farm behind when the sea of fire to the left was extinguished by a blue fog; and toward evening only the highest tops of the tallest trees reflected the departing light of day. Night soon came on. As his noble beast rapidly struck the grassy soil with strong hoofs he saw that he could not reach home in less than an hour.
A nameless discontent seized him. The longing for the beloved one, which he had so nobly fought all these hours, now asserted its rights, and so filled his breast that he could hardly breathe. Minutes seemed like hours. There was also another distressing feeling--a feeling of fear for something he could not conceive of, for which he had no name, and which may on that account have been more terrible. In all his life he had never before had such an experience. Nearest to it were the frightful dreams that had terrified him when a boy, from which he in vain sought to wake. Lambert groaned aloud, and Hans groaned under the pressure of the rider's legs.