158 THE YOUNG WIDOW OF BREMEN. 



head, her eyes fell full on the stranger's features : she gave him one wild 

 earnest look, shrieked, and sank lifeless in my arms. The stranger 

 sprang forwards to hold her. " Lay her on the grass," said he, " she 

 has only fainted ; run to the house for water, and I will support her." 



When I came back she was sitting on the grass, leaning on the 

 stranger, whom she introduced to me as Ernest Von Harstenleit, a 

 friend of her early days, whom she had not seen for a long long time ; 

 the sudden meeting, she said, had been too great a shock for her weak 

 frame. I begged her to let us take her home, that she might rest, and 

 quiet her fevered nerves. We proceeded thither the stranger and I sup- 

 porting her between us. When we entered she appeared unable to bear 

 up a moment longer, and called, faintingly, for water. Old Muller, who 

 had watched her return with much anxiety, came himself to attend on her. 

 She looked wildly but significantly at him, and then at me pointed to 

 the stranger, and gasped out rather than spoke " Seize him ! He is 

 Adolphe ; Adolphe, for whom my boy was murdered !" She fainted as 

 the words left her lips, and we were running towards her, when a quick 

 movement of the stranger warned us not to let him escape. The unde- 

 fined feeling which had made me gaze so earnestly upon him was fully 

 explained. He was, indeed, Adolphe Brauer, for whose supposed mur- 

 der my poor young friend had been executed ! The conspiracy to pro- 

 cure the death of young Hermann, by this false accusation, was clearly 

 brought home to him, and he was executed for it ; but the accomplice 

 who had appeared as his father, escaped detection. The poor widow 

 only survived for a few days the shock of this sudden discovery ; and 

 from his confession, and her disclosure to me, just before her death, the 

 tissue. of this strange and mournful story was made complete. 



Ernest Von Harstenleit was the Bavarian officer, of whom mention 

 was made in the beginning of my story. Mary confessed that her hus- 

 band's suspicions were not groundless. During his absence her heart 

 had been won by the stranger, and when he returned, she had forgotten 

 her duty and was in Ernest's power. Her husband's fury drove Von 

 Harstenleit ignominiously from the town; and he fled, no one knew 

 whither. During his absence, it appeared by his own confession, that 

 the wretch had employed a woman, since but too notorious throughout 

 Germany, who entered Von Korper's service as cook, merely to poison him. 



It was long ere the officer ventured again on the scene ; but in his 

 new character of steward he soon regained his ascendancy over the 

 widow, who had no suspicion of his agency in her husband's death. 

 Indeed, I suspect, he was the only man she ever really loved. The fury 

 of young Hermann, who discovered their attachment, drove away the 

 disguised steward ; and the scene that ensued, happened just as poor 

 Hermann had confessed save in the catastrophe. 



Burning with hatred, Adolphe fled wounded, and without his hat, 

 which had been struck off in the struggle. He resumed the military 

 dress which he had worn previous to his assuming the disguise of a 

 steward, and Adolphe Brauer was now no more. With the malice of a 

 fiend, Ernest devised the plot, which, by the aid of a suborned villain, 

 brought poor Hermann to the scaffold. He would have remained un- 

 detected, had he not madly thought Mary's love would follow him 

 through every depth of crime. No eye but hers could recognize him, and 

 on her he relied undoubtingly. 



But though the sanctuary of her affections had been polluted though 



