Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 137.djvu/810

804 twisted up the cap between them, it was evident that he was going through a sharp tussle with his conscience. Finally, the desire to justify himself against the charge of superstition triumphed, and he spoke.

"Fräulein," he began in a tremulous voice, still leaning against the tree-stem beside him, "you will remember how I told you that both I and my father were born in this strange country, and that it was my grandfather who accepted the offer which the Government had made him, and left his nation to settle here. It was a rich farm which they gave him. He brought his young wife with him, and his only child was born here soon after he had settled down; and yet he should have rued the day when he came to this land. He had not been settled a year in the valley when a Wallachian who worked on his farm told him the story of Gaura Dracului, and of the treasure which the brigands had buried there, and which no one had found.

"My grandfather loved gold. The story inflamed his thirst for riches. For weeks he dreamt of nothing else; and at last he determined, in concert with the Wallachian labourer, to whom he promised half the gain, to sound the depth of the Devil's Hole.

"The two went up in secret – not even my grandmother knew the object of the expedition; and it was only next day, when the Wallachian came back alone, half mad with terror, and told her how the rope had broken in his hands, and his companion plunged into the abyss before his eyes, – it was only then that she heard of Gaura Dracului."

The Bohemian broke off, and crossed himself. No one spoke for a moment. Very swift, very silent, very terrible must such a death have been.

"When I was ten years old," said the Bohemian, "my father took me up here to this place and showed it to me. He made me swear by my devotion to the Wunderbaum at Choteborschwitz that I would never reveal the spot to anybody. It was his mother, – my grandmother I remember her still – who had told him the story."

"But," said Gretchen, after a moment of silence, "I cannot see what logical object your father had with that vow. The more the place is known, the less danger there would be of a person stumbling in."

"That may be, Fräulein, but I was bound to hold my vow. My father meant it for the best, no doubt. I have seldom come to the spot myself, and I never cut shingles in this part of the forest. I saw something happen here long ago when I was a child, which made me sad for many days. There were two young kids which had strayed near this place, and on that bank above they began to butt at each other in play. It was the prettiest sight you could see, and I laughed as I looked on; but I stopped laughing very soon. One of them made a false step; he had got his horns entangled with his playfellow's horns, and the two fell together down that hole. They went straight down; there was not a sound; it was all quiet in a moment."

"And I suppose that the devils had roast-kid for dinner that day," observed Kurt, flippantly.

"We once carried a big stone here," went on the Bohemian, unperturbed – "I and some peasants who knew of the spot. It took six of us to carry it; and when we threw it down, the breath of air which came up knocked the caps off our six heads as if with a blow."