ON THE MOUNTAIN. 209 



by — perhaps it was three-quarters of an hour, or may be 

 an hour after — he heard their voices. Presently he saw 

 them winding up the path that led towards him. He 

 allowed them to advance till they were about eighty 

 yards distant, and then let fly at the foremost : he hit 

 him right in the middle of the breast, and the man 

 dropped down on the spot, stone dead. When they 

 heard the shot, they all stopped, and ran back some dis- 

 tance, and grasped their rifles. They were exceedingly 

 astonished, for they saw no one, and could not tell where 

 the shot came from. K — , as he lay among the latschen, 

 could hear them talking together, and deliberating what 

 they should do. Some were for going back, when one 

 of them said, it was a shame to think of going away 

 without knowing more about the matter. If even there 

 were six or seven foresters there, why should they mind ? 

 there were twenty-three of them, and it would be a cow- 

 ardly thing to turn back for a mere handful of men. 

 Come what might, he said, he would go on, and as to 

 the others they might follow if they liked. So with rifle 

 in hand all ready to fire, on he went alone, straight to- 

 ward the place where K — was lying concealed. He let 

 him come on to about sixty paces, and fired : the shot 

 turned the fellow quite round on one side ; he stopped 

 short and then fell, and when the others saw this they 

 all turned, and were off as fast as they could go. K — 

 now crept down the mountain among the latschen on the 

 opposite side, keeping in the bushes, and passing through 

 the woods so that nobody might see him. I don't know 

 how it was, but when he came down by the Gems Wand, 

 instead of going the way he always did, he took the path 

 that led to Baierisch Zell. It leads, you know, over the 

 mountain stream, and there is a very narrow path along 

 it, and across it is a bridge — you passed it when you 



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