The magician spoke three words and made two passes in the air before he turned and pointed to Rothdam. Instantly the bell in the town hall which called all villagers to the dyke tolled wildly. The wind was rising and shrilling louder and louder, and the sky was now of midnight blackness. The Mayor looked up in wretched terror at the figure on the dyke and started to rush at him as if to pitch him into the sea. Kahnale held him back. "Wait," he said. "If you touched the devil servant you would die." Above the shriek of the wind rose the voice from the dyke. "Nevaeh ni," said the voice. "In heaven," muttered Kahnale. "It is almost done." Down the road in the teeth of the gale came the villagers of Rothdam. In the van were the Mayor's police in red coats. They carried clubs and blunderbusses, and one, more hurriedly summoned than his companions, held a poker. "There," cried the Mayor, "shoot that man on the dyke!" And with the first flash of light the foremost guard ran halfway up the steep embankment and leveled his blunderbuss. He fired. The roar of the gun was answered by a crash of thunder. A fang of fire darted from the center of the clouds and the guard rolled down the dyke and lay still at the bottom. "Tra ohw," came the voice from the dyke. The priest, not daunted by the fate of the guard, hurried close to the side of the swaying figure and sprinkled him with holy water, but no sooner had the water left his hands than each drop changed to a tiny tongue of fire, leaping and dancing on the shoulder of the devil servant. The priest drew back in horror and the Mayor, with a cry of fear, threw himself at the foot of the dyke and buried his face in the long grasses. High above the booming of the gale and the crash of the waves against the barrier came the voice from the dyke, "Rehtaf." "Father," said Kahnale, "I come, master devil!" he cried with one hand raised. The sea which had almost reached the top of the dyke suddenly receded. Back and back it went and bared a deep and slimy floor. On that floor were many unswept things of horror. The earth trembled. The black clouds were banks of floating flame. The villagers turned to run from the dyke, for now the sea was returning. It rushed toward the dyke in a wave a hundred feet high. Out of the crowd one ran forward and not back. It was a girl with flaxen hair and red ribbons. She ran straight to the figure on the dyke. "It's Gretchen," she called. "Save me, Hans, save me." She threw her arms around the boy's neck and kissed him. The wall of water hung on the edge of the dyke like a violin string drawn tight. Then it surged forward and swallowed up both boy and girl. Some folk in Rothdam say that Hans dropped the book of black magic and kissed Gretchen before the water swept over them, but the villagers are not sure about this trifle, since at that moment they were watching the rebirth of a lost world.