"Try to be more composed," said Adam, kindly; but Martina's excitement every instant increased, and she turned hastily to him saying:--
"You are to blame! a father can deny his child, and pass him by as if he were nothing to him in this world--but a mother--never! You did this!"
"Why do you reproach me at such a moment as this?"
"I do not reproach you. Why are you so cruel?"
"I am neither unkind nor cruel--only do try to command your feelings; from this day forth all your sorrows shall cease. Come closer to me, my Martina!"
"No, no, I cannot rest!" cried Martina, suddenly, after having leant on Adam for a few minutes--"I cannot--Oh, gracious Father! do with me what thou wilt, only do not deprive me of my child, my Joseph; he is innocent; I alone am guilty--this man and I."
She went some steps from Adam, as if she could not bear his vicinity; she no longer shed tears, but she sobbed convulsively with dry eyes, as if her heart would break.
The scene in the wood was like the procession of the "Wild Huntsman;" the men with torches and lanterns, and their eager shouts and cries, and cracking of whips, and ringing of bells; and the dogs, too, carrying lanterns round their necks, and rushing along the ravines barking, and then galloping up the hills, still barking and pressing forwards, till recalled by the voice of their masters. It was fortunate that such good order was maintained. No one could recognise his neighbour, for each man was a moving mass of snow, and the hills and rocks looked down by the torchlight in amazement, at the men who had come there to shout out, and seek a young child.
"See, how all the village loved him!" said Martina to Adam, relating to him how the boy had wakened her on the previous night, three times, to ask which way his father would come; and she reproached herself severely for having listened to Leegart, and sent him out of the house alone; she might have known that something dreadful was sure to occur on this day.
Adam was sadly perplexed, and did not know what to say; and he was more sad than ever when he thought of the Forest Mill, where they were all sitting waiting for him, and remembered the treachery towards Martina he had been persuaded to commit this very day.