"Tell me," cried Hilda, the instant that Gretchen had closed the door after her, looking around at the same time with something of her old sharp vigilance--"tell me, it is not too late yet to save him?" "To_ save_ him!" repeated Gualtier. "Yes. That is what brought me here." Gualtier looked at her with eager scrutiny, seeking to fathom her full meaning. Suspecting the truth, he was yet unwilling to believe it. His answer was given in slow, deliberate tones. "No," said he, "it is--not--yet--too--late--to--save him--if that is really what you wish." "That is what I have come for," said Hilda; "I am going to take my place at his bedside, to undo the past, and bring him back to life. That is my purpose. Do you hear?" she said, while her white lips quivered with excitement, and her shattered frame trembled with the intensity of her emotion. "I hear, my lady," said Gualtier, with his old respect, but with a dull light in his gray eyes, and a cold and stern intonation which told of the anger which was rising within him. Once he had shaken off her authority, and had spoken to her with the tone of a master. It was not probable that he would recede now from the stand which he had then taken. But, on the other hand, Hilda did not now seem like one over whom his old menaces would have any effect. There was in her, besides her suffering, an air of reckless self-sacrifice, which made it seem as if no threats of his could again affect her. "You hear?" said she, with feverish impatience. "Have you nothing more to say?" "No, nothing. It is for you to speak," said Gualtier, gruffly. "You began." "He must be saved," said Hilda; "and I must save him; and you must help me." Gualtier turned away his head, while a dark frown came over his face. The gesture excited Hilda still more. "What!" she hissed, springing to her feet, and grasping his arm, "do you hesitate? Do you refuse to assist me?" "Our relations are changed," said Gualtier, slowly, turning round as he spoke. "This thing I will not do. I have begun my work." As he turned he encountered the eyes of Hilda, which were fixed on him--stern, wrathful, menacing. "You have begun it!" she repeated. "It was my work--not yours. I order you to desist, and you must obey. You can not do any thing else. To go on is impossible, if I stand between you and him. Only one thing is left for you, and that is to obey me, and assist me as before." "Obey you!" said Gualtier, with a cold and almost ferocious glance. "The time for obedience I think is past. That much you ought to know. And what is it that you ask? What? To thrust from me the dearest hope of my life, and just as it was reaching fruition." Hilda's eyes were fastened on Gualtier as he said these words. The scorn with which he disowned any obedience, the confidence with which he spoke of that renunciation of his former subordination, were but ill in accordance with those words with which he expressed his "dearest hope."