“You should have seen her then,” broke in Eckbert quickly.  “Her youth, her innocence, her beauty—­and what an incomprehensible charm her solitary breeding had given her!  To me she seemed like a wonder, and I loved her inexpressibly.  I had no property, but with the help of her love I attained my present condition of comfortable prosperity.  We moved to this place, and our union thus far has never brought us a single moment of remorse.”

“But while I have been chattering,” began Bertha again, “the night has grown late.  Let us go to bed.”

She rose to go to her room.  Walther kissed her hand and wished her a good-night, adding: 

“Noble woman, I thank you.  I can readily imagine you with the strange bird, and how you fed the little Strohmi.”

Without answering she left the room.  Walther also lay down to sleep, but Eckbert continued to walk up and down the room.

“Aren’t human beings fools?” he finally asked himself.  “I myself induced my wife to tell her story, and now I regret this confidence!  Will he not perhaps misuse it?  Will he not impart it to others?  Will he not perhaps—­for it is human nature—­come to feel a miserable longing for our gems and devise plans to get them and dissemble his nature?”

It occurred to him that Walther had not taken leave of him as cordially as would perhaps have been natural after so confidential a talk.  When the soul is once led to suspect, it finds confirmations of its suspicions in every little thing.  Then again Eckbert reproached himself for his ignoble distrust of his loyal friend, but he was unable to get the notion entirely out of his mind.  All night long he tossed about with these thoughts and slept but little.

Bertha was sick and could not appear for breakfast.  Walther seemed little concerned about it, and furthermore he left the knight in a rather indifferent manner.  Eckbert could not understand his conduct.  He went in to see his wife—­she lay in a severe fever and said that her story the night before must have excited her in this manner.

After that evening Walther visited his friend’s castle but rarely, and even when he did come he went away again after a few trivial words.  Eckbert was exceedingly troubled by this behavior; to be sure, he tried not to let either Bertha or Walther notice it, but both of them must surely have been aware of his inward uneasiness.

Bertha’s sickness grew worse and worse.  The doctor shook his head—­the color in her cheeks had disappeared, and her eyes became more and more brilliant.

One morning she summoned her husband to her bedside and told the maids to withdraw.