Regard yon
treacherous lake, Adelheid! Can we fancy that sleeping mirror the same
boiling cauldron on which we were so lately tossed, helpless and nearly
hopeless?"
"Hopeless, Sigismund, but for thee!"
"Thou forgett'st the daring Italian, without whose coolness and skill we
must indeed have irredeemably perished."
"And what would it be to me if the worthless bark were saved, while my
father and his friend were abandoned to the frightful fate that befell the
patron and that unhappy peasant of Berne!"
The pulses of the young man beat high, for there was a tenderness in the
tones of Adelheid to which he was unaccustomed, and which, indeed, he had
never before discovered in her voice.
"I will go seek this brave mariner," he said, trembling lest his
self-command should be again lost by the seductions of such a
communion:--"it is time he had more substantial proofs of our gratitude."
"No, Sigismund," returned the maiden; firmly, and in a way to chain him
to the spot, "thou must not quit me yet--I have much to say--much that
touches my future happiness, and, I am perhaps weak enough to believe,
thine.
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