Her eyes still rested upon his countenance, as if she were expecting a reply; but Michael turned somewhat aside, and said, changing the conversation, "The prospect is growing more and more veiled; we shall soon be surrounded by clouds." The weather did, in fact, look more threatening; the sun had begun to set, but his rays were struggling with the mists floating up everywhere, as if some leader of a mighty host had sounded his trumpet-call, heard of the whole vast mountain world, and the cloud-phantoms were rising on all sides to obey the summons, some with slow majesty, some in desperate haste. Up from the deeps and abysses soared the mist unceasingly, like a white veil, noiseless and ghost-like, sweeping up over the forests, leaving a fluttering pennon here and there amidst the tops of the pines, and then soaring aloft again. From each side across the gray Alps single clouds came trooping, followed by huge masses, all rolling towards the Eagle ridge, where they gathered ever darker and more threatening. The meadows upon which lay Saint Michael soon looked like an island in the midst of a billowy, swelling sea, the waves of which rose higher each minute. There it gleamed white, like the foam of dashing, leaping breakers, and there it lay gray and formless as in shade, while high above on the peaks of the ridge, still lit by the sunlight, golden, shimmering mists were sailing, shot by strange, quivering rays. A gleaming magic veil was woven about the rocky head and the glacier crown; they stood half veiled, half revealed in the golden atmosphere. But at their feet the storm was gathering thick, and now the first dull thunder rolled, seeming to come from the very depths of the mountains, and dying rumbling in the distance. The air had hitherto been quiet; now the wind began to rise. The young Countess's veil fluttered aloft and caught in a hanging branch of the wild-rose bush, from which she vainly tried to extricate it. The thorns held their prey fast, and Rodenberg, who came to her aid, must have been rather awkward, for the band of her hat slipped and the hat fell off. Michael, who was stooping to disentangle the delicate tissue, shrank suddenly and dropped his hand, for close before his eyes gleamed uncovered the thick braids, the 'red fairy gold.' "Have you scratched your hand?" asked Hertha, noticing his start. "No!" He plunged his hand into the thorny tangle and pulled away both hat and veil; but the thorns revenged themselves: the veil was torn, and a few drops of blood trickled from the young man's hand. "Thank you," said Hertha, taking her hat from him; "but you are a rash assistant. How wrong to plunge your hand in among the thorns! It is bleeding." There was real commiseration in her tone, but the reply was all the colder. "It is not worth mentioning; it is the merest scratch."