Once more they paused--they were in full view of the distraught Sigurd, and he turned his head towards them, shaking back his long fair hair with his old favorite gesture and laughing in apparent glee. Then he suddenly raised his arms, and, clasping his hands together, poised himself as though he were some winged thing about to fly.
"Sigurd! Sigurd!" shouted Güldmar, his strong voice tremulous with anguish. "Come back! come back to Thelma!"
At the sound of that beloved name, the unhappy creature seemed to hesitate, and, profiting by that instant of irresolution, Errington and Lorimer rushed forward--Too late! Sigurd saw them coming, and glided with stealthy caution to the very brink of the torrent, where there was scarcely any foothold--there he looked back at his would-be rescuers with an air of mystery and cunning, and broke into a loud derisive laugh.
Then--still with clasped hands and smiling face--unheeding the shout of horror that broke from those who beheld him--he leaped, and fell! Down, down into the roaring abyss! For one half-second--one lightning flash--his twisted figure, like a slight black speck was seen against the wide roseate glory of the tumbling cascade--then it disappeared, engulfed and lost for ever! Gone,--with all his wild poet fancies and wandering dreams--gone, with his unspoken love and unguessed sorrows--gone where dark things shall be made light,--and where the broken or tangled chain of the soul's intelligence shall be mended and made perfect by the tender hands of the All-Wise and the All-Loving One, whose ways are too gloriously vast for our finite comprehension.
"Gone, mistress!" as he would have said to the innocent cause of his heart's anguish. "Gone where I shall grow straight and strong and brave! Mistress, if you meet me in Valhalla, you will love me!"