Still she decided upon the second alternative as the safer. The bandage was arranged; she was just about to raise her aunt gently from her lap and arrange her as comfortable a couch as possible, when through the bushes, through the hedges, between the trees, there came upon her what seemed like thousands and thousands of serpents, whose hissing sounded even through the howling of the storm, with a strange and horrible noise that made Elsa's blood run chill. For a moment she listened breathlessly, and then with a wild shriek started to her feet, snatching up her aunt, and with the strength of despair dragging her up the steps to save the helpless woman and herself from the flood which had broken over the park. She had hardly reached the last step before the water was pouring through the lower ones, and seeming to be everywhere at once, foaming and roaring through the hedge which ran from the summer-house to the castle, as if over a weir, rushing into the hollow, which was no longer a valley but the bed of a broad stream whose waters, pouring in from either side, met with a crash like thunder, throwing up jets of water to the balcony, over the edge of which Elsa leant with a shudder. A bench ran round the inner side of the balcony. Elsa laid her aunt here, who was falling from one fainting fit into another, after wrapping her up as warmly as possible, for the greater part with her own clothes. And there she sat, with the poor thing's head again in her lap, as the storm howled and the flood roared around her, and shook the frail slender wooden edifice in every joint of its worm-eaten planks, praying that God would send some one to them--the only man who could save them in their fearful need. CHAPTER XII. As Ottomar's steps died away upon the creaking stairs and across the hall, Ferdinanda sprang up, and wringing her hands, paced two or three times up and down the little room; then she threw herself down again as Ottomar had last seen her--her face in her hands, her head leaning against the back of the sofa. But she had not cried then, neither did she cry now; she had no tears to shed; she had no hope left, no wish save one--to die for him since she could not live for him, since her life could only be a burden and a torment to him. Why had she not believed his brother officer, with the clear brow and keen, pitiful eyes, who had said to her: