The Count could not even understand half of what the young engineer called to him, who had suddenly—he could not see whence—rushed up to him, as he persistently pointed down below:
“Breakwater—tremendous breakers—boats wrecked—people furious—get back—happen—”
“What should happen to me?” screamed back the Count in answer.
“Mischief—the lady too—unpardonable of you—too late!”
The young man pointed no longer below, but in the direction from which they had come.
The Count, startled more by the look of terror in the young man’s face than by the warning itself, turned in his saddle, and at the same moment set spurs to his horse. He had seen a crowd of men and women—foremost the one who had just threatened him—rushing down the street, brandishing sticks, cudgels, and knives.
His first thought had been to take refuge in the inn, which must afford him shelter till he could speak a few words to the people, perhaps from the window—fear had evidently driven them wild. And with this purpose, dashing on before Carla, he had almost gained the little open space in front of the inn, when he suddenly discovered that he was only going from bad to worse.
In the middle of the square, lying on its side, the keel turned towards him, lay one of the Sundin boats, which some huge wave must have flung up here, and around the stranded vessel, with the surf at their feet, whose storm-beaten foam was blowing in clouds of spray over them, were dancing and raging—as only madmen or men who had drunk to madness could have raved—a crowd of navvies and sailors who had taken possession of all the provisions the inn could give them, before the approaching flood engulfed everything.
The idea flashed through the Count’s head that it was his duty, if any man’s, to interpose here, and at least to attempt by his authority to avert the terrible evils that must be brought upon the unhappy village by these madmen, but he had already repeatedly had the most violent scenes with these ruffians, who were always increasing their demands; he would be torn to pieces if the men who were now pursuing him, urged on by that miserable woman, should join these.
All this passed like lightning through his bewildered brain, but he never thought of Carla for a moment; he was even astonished when, having turned aside from the main street, and dashing at a venture down a side lane to the left, he found himself galloping along the meadows behind the dunes, he suddenly saw Carla again at his side.
“That was done in the nick of time!” cried he; “those scoundrels would have murdered us.”
Carla answered not a word. Notwithstanding her extremely short sight, she had been able to form a tolerably correct idea of the danger they had escaped; she knew from the gestures and shouts of the people she had dashed past that it was a matter of life and death to escape them, and she knew also that the man at whose side she now rode had deserted her at the critical moment, and that she had to thank only the speed of her horse and her own powers of riding for her life. Would Ottomar have dashed forward in such a way, careless whether she succeeded in following him or not; whether she escaped from the narrow lanes and little gardens, to do which she had at last been forced to leap a hedge, amidst the shower of stones and sticks which were hurled after her? “He is a coward,” her heart whispered to her; “he only cares for himself; I should only have been his victim.”
“This is a bad business,” thought the Count. “She is affronted of course, though after all, anybody else would have done the same in my place.—You don’t know how those fellows detest me!”
He spoke the last words aloud, by way of saying something at any rate.
Carla answered not a word.
“An infernal business,” thought the Count, relapsing into silence.
So they galloped on, side by side, through the sand, which the unceasing rain had fortunately somewhat hardened, along the inner edge of the dunes, which were now the only barrier between them and the sea, which thundered and roared on the other side, often tossing up the broken edges of its waves high enough to shower down upon them in torrents, Fortunately the wooden bridge still stood over the brook which ran into the sea close by Ahlbeck, through a sharp cut in the dunes; the brook even had not overspread its banks so much here as above, where the lower ground offered no opposition to the water; but the Count thought with a shudder of what might happen when they got to the Pölitz farm, on the edge of the broad hollow which extended to the sea almost entirely unprotected by the dunes. Behind the farm, towards Golmberg, was a still broader and deeper hollow, but he did not trouble himself about that. If once they reached the farm, which itself stood on higher ground, they would find a road leading from it along the back of the hills straight to Warnow. The Count knew the ground well, he had ridden over it fifty times while hunting.
And now they came to the first hollow. On the right, where the hills opened out, was a wall of surf, whose crest threatened at any moment to topple over. More than one wave must have broken through already, which had left smaller and larger pools in the lowest parts of the ground; evidently not a moment was to be lost. But the Count saw that the passage might be
