CHAPTER I.
"Do pray tell me, Hellwig, where in this world are you going to?"
"Straight to X------, by your leave!" was the half-defiant, half-laughing answer sent back.                 
"But your beast never climbed a hill before in his whole life-time! You are a rash fellow, Hellwig. Hold on, I want to get out! I have no earthly desire to see myself upset, and every bone in my body broken. Hold on, will you?"
"Upset? I? Well, it would be the first time in my life" – he was probably about to say; but a terrible crash followed, which closed the lips of the speaker as effectually as though he had been dumb. The struggling and stamping of a horse were, for an instant, audible; then the creature stood up free, and then, like mad, bolted off at a tangent.
"Well, we are in a fine pickle, to be sure!" growled the first speaker, finally, as he lifted himself up from the wet, freshly plowed ground. "Eh, Hellwig, good fellow, are you alive still?
"Yes," called out Hellwig from no great distance, as he groped about on the soaking clods, feeling for his wig. Not a trace of self-confidence or the spirit of ridicule was any longer discernible in the tones of that feeble voice. The third victim, too, next sought to recover his equilibrium by a movement upon all-fours, at the same time giving utterance to abominable oaths and groans; for his immense corpulence felt an irresistible attraction toward Mother Earth. Finally there was regained that noble position which distinguishes man as the most exalted being in the scale of creation, for the three fallen, comrades stood upon their feet, and bethought themselves of what had befallen them, and of what it was now needful to do.
In the first place, the little chaise, in which these three gentlemen had set out that morning from X-----, their native city, upon a hunting expedition, now lay upset on the side of that unlucky hill, its four wheels pointing skyward, as the three found out by feeling; the hoofs of the runaway steed had long ceased to be heard, and a pitch-dark night hid from view the results of Hell wig's overweening self-confidence.
"One thing is certain, we cannot spend the night in this place. We must manage to move on!" exhorted Hell-wig, at last, with animating voice.
"All right, go on ordering!" growled the fat man, meanwhile privately convincing himself that the distressing, grating sound near the region of his heart was occasioned, not by the breaking of his ribs, but the fragments of his beautiful meerschaum. "Give further orders, as becomes you, after you have come within a hair's-breadth of murdering the heads of two families through your shameful levity. But pass the night in this lion's den I shall not. Come on with your advice; it is needed, I can tell you. I tell you one thing, though, ten horses could not draw me from this spot, unless I had a light. I am sinking in the mire, it is true, and a cold wind from over yonder gives me a promise of the rheumatism, that is good for at least six months of aching joints. I resign myself to that, you may depend, Hell wig! But I am not going to be so mad as voluntarily to run the risk of breaking my arms and legs, or putting out my eyes, amid the numberless pitfalls of this blessed region of country."
"Do not be a fool, doctor," said the third member of the party; "you cannot stand here on one leg, like a mile-post, and wait till Hellwig and I grope our way into town and bring back help. I had noticed, for a long while, that this distinguished charioteer drove entirely too much to the left. I go for our now proceeding straight across the field, turning to the right, when we'll strike the public road, I'll answer for it. And now come on, without making any more ado; think on wife and child, who are even now, perhaps, crying and moaning, because you are missing at their evening meal."
The fat man muttered something between his teeth about "miserable management;" but none the less abandoned his post and groped his way forward, with the rest. And a struggling time they had of it! Clouds of dirt, the size of a man's fist, stuck to their hunting-boots, while now and then an incautious foot would come down into some puddle with a splash that sent the water in showers over the heads and pilot-cloth coats of the three unfortunate wayfarers. They gained the public road, however, without any serious mishap, and then moved bravely and comfortably onward. Even the doctor gradually recovered his good-humor, and growled out in a terrific bass voice: "Heyday! footing it, we do excellently well."
As they neared the town, a light loomed out of the darkness, coming in all haste to meet the travelers, and Hellwig forthwith recognized his man-servant, Henry, in the broad, jovial countenance that rose above the lantern so brightly illuminated by its rays.
"La! Master, Mr. Hellwig, is that you?" shouted the fellow. "The mistress imagines that you are lying out stark and cold."
"How does my wife know already of an accident having befallen us?"
"Why, you see, Mr. Hellwig, a coachful of play-actors came to town to-night"—the honest fellow had only this one appellation to bestow upon actors, jugglers, rope-dancers, and the like—'' and when the coach drew up at The Lion, there was our horse tied behind, as if it belonged to the concern. The host of The Lion immediately recognized our old horse, and brought him home himself. But, oh! such a fright as took hold of the mistress! Nothing would do but that I must be off instantly with my lantern, and Fredericka must boil a pot of camomile tea."
Camomile tea! Hem! I think a glass of mulled wine, or at least, a draught of warm beer, would most likely have been more suitable."
"Yes, I should have thought so, too, Mr. Hellwig; but you know how my mistress is—"
"Very well, Henry, very well. Now go in front with your lantern. We shall make out to get home."
On the market-place the three companions in misery parted, with a silent pressure of the hand—one dutifully to swallow his camomile tea, and the others, with the depressing conviction that a certain lecture awaited them at home, inasmuch as their spouses had never looked too kindly upon the "noble passion" of their lords; and now their only means of propitiation, a lot of game, lay buried beneath the overturned chaise, and their hunting-suits, stiff with mud as they were, would almost certainly change the first embrace into a sudden outburst of indignation.
Next morning, at every street corner were pasted red bills announcing the arrival of the famous conjurer, Orlowsky, and his troop of distinguished artists, while a young woman went from house to house offering tickets for the show. And very beautiful was this woman, with her magnificent mass of light hair, and imposing figure that was full of nobleness and grace; but her lovely countenance was pale—"pale as death," people said—and if she raised her long, golden eyelashes, as was rarely the case, the tearful glance of her dark gray eyes was inexpressibly touching.
She came also to Hellwig's house, the handsomest on the market-place.
" Madame,'' called out Henry, speaking into a chamber on the first floor, while he held in his hand the well-polished brass knob of the shining white door, " the play-actor's wife is at the door!"
"What does she want?" called back sternly a female voice.
"Her husband is going to play tomorrow, and she would be glad if the lady would buy a ticket."
"We are respectable, Christian people, and have no money for such frivolities. Send her away, Henry!"
The fellow shut the door again. He scratched behind his ear, and looked greatly confused; for the play-actor's wife must have heard every word. For an instant she stood before him, like some one who has received a shock, a fugitive blush colored her pale face, and a heavy sigh heaved her chest. Just now a little window that looked into the entrance-hall was softly opened, and a man's voice asked for a ticket, in an under-tone. It was handed to him, and in return, a hard dollar was slipped into the young woman's palm. Before she could even look up, the window was once more closed, and a green curtain hung, in impenetrable folds, behind its panes of glass.
With an awkward bow, and smiling good-naturedly, Henry opened the front door, and the woman tottered out, tottered further on the way, so beset for her with briers and
thorns.
The man-servant picked up again a pair of highly polished boots, which he had just now set down, upon the appearance of the woman, and entered the chamber of his master, who shows himself to us now in the broad daylight, as an oldish little man, with a thin, pale, but infinitely good-humored face.
"Ah, Mr. Hellwig," opined Henry, after he had deposited the boots in their accustomed place," that was right well done of you to buy her ticket! The poor woman did look too pitiful. I am sorry for her, though her husband were ten times over a rogue. He will have no luck here— mark my words, Mr. Hellwig!"
"Why not, Henry?"
"Why, because that jackdaw, our horse, stuck like a burr to his carriage as he drove up to the door—that bodes no good, for the unlucky beast had just come from the scene of an accident. Now, mind what I have said, Mr. Hellwig, those people are going to have no luck!"
He shook his thick skull and left, since his master would say neither yea nor nay to his prophesying, and returned to the front hall, in order to place exactly straight before his strict mistress's door the straw mat which the strange woman had unwittingly disarranged.
CHAPTER II.
THE town-hall was crowded with spectators, and still people came streaming up the steps.    Henry stood in the thickest of the throng, and sought surreptitiously to gain breathing space by means of hard puffs and secret attacks upon the corns of those nearest him.    "Bless me, what a storm we should have, if the madame could only know what I do!   The master will have to go to confession betimes tomorrow morning," he whispered to a neighbor, smiling pleasantly, while he stretched out his bony fore-anger, and pointed to one of the elevated seats ranged along the sides of the hall.    There sat Mr. Hellwig, in company with his comrade in misfortune, Dr. Bohm.  It a cost the honest fellow trouble enough to discover the whereabouts of his puny master, for there was a strong representation of dignitaries. The programme had, of course, promised many new wonders, and its conclusion ran as follows:
"Madame d'Orlowsky appears as the Lady of the Shield. Six military men will shoot at her with heavily loaded muskets, and she will hew the balls in two in the air."
The inhabitants of X------had assembled mainly with a view to convince themselves of the truth of this miracle. The beautiful young woman had a wakened general interest, and every one wanted to see how she would look, when she knew that so many deadly weapons were being fired at her. As for the juggler, he too succeeded in engaging the attention of his audience upon his feats of skill. He was what the ladies call an interesting man. Of medium height, slender, flexible shape, with regular but pale features, brown locks and expressive eyes, he displayed very elegant manners, and the peculiar accent of his German, marking him as the son of an unhappy, dismembered nation, made him yet more attractive. But all this was entirely forgotten, when, as announced, the six soldiers marched up under the command of a subaltern officer. A sound arose from the audience like the roaring of the surge. Then followed suddenly the breathless silence of suspense.
The Pole stepped up to a table and made the cartridges in full view of the spectators. With a hammer he knocked separately upon each ball, in order to convince his breathless auditors that they were actually two-ounce musket-balls. Then he gave to each one of the soldiers a cartridge and let him load in presence of the public.
The conjuror rang a bell. Immediately afterward the lady made her appearance from behind a broad screen. Slowly she proceeded to one side of the stage and took her station opposite to the soldiers. A wonderful apparition she was, her left arm being covered by her shield, while in her right hand she held the sword. A white robe flowed in rich folds to her feet, while her hips were incased in shining silver scales, and her glorious bust was covered with burnished armor.
But what was all this splendor compared to the pale luster of her wavy, golden hair that escaped from her helmet and fell down almost to the hem of her robe! Her pale, melancholy countenance fixed its mournful dance upon the mouths of the deadly weapons that threatened from so near a point. Not an eyelash quivered. Not the slightest movement of her light, fluttering garment was to be seen. She stood there like a stone statue. The last word of command echoed through the awfully silent hall; the six shots deafened the ear—whizzing the sword cleft the air, and twelve half balls rattled on the ground.
For an instant longer the form of the Lady of the Shield was seen to stand motionless—the smoke from the powder veiled her features, and her armor glistened but faintly through the cloud. Then suddenly she tottered; sword and shield fell clanking to the ground, while she threw up her right hand, that was trembling convulsively as though seeking for help, and fell into the arms of her husband, who now came running up, with the heart-rending shriek: "Oh, Lord, I am shot!" He lifted her behind the screen and immediately afterward, like a madman, rushed up to the soldiers.
They had all been, directed, in loading their muskets, to bite off the balls and keep them in their mouth—that was the whole of the miracle. One of them, however, an awkward boor, perfectly bewildered by the sight of such a multitude of spectators, had lost his senses at the critical moment, so that when, at the passionate summons of the conjuror, the other five forthwith produced the balls from their mouths, to his own horror he had only a little powder to show. His ball had pierced the unhappy woman.
The features of the Pole became distorted by the agony of despair. At this result, and wholly beside himself, he struck the involuntary criminal in the face.
Instantly an incredible tumult arose in the hall. Several ladies fainted and numberless voices called out for a surgeon. But Dr. Bohm, who had apprehended the state of the case more quickly than the rest, had already been a long while behind the screen at the side of the wounded woman. When at last he came out again, with blanched race, he said to Hell wig, in low tones: " Poor, splendid creature, her doom is sealed!"
An hour later the juggler's wife lay on a bed in the inn at The Lion.    They had brought her from the hall on a sofa, Henry had been one of the bearers.    "Well, Mr. Hellwig, was I right or wrong about that unlucky animal, our horse?" he had asked his master in going past, at the same time that great tears were coursing their way down his cheeks.
The woman lay still, with her eyes closed. Her long hair disheveled, now fell in loose tresses over the white pillows and the side of the bed, and its ends formed golden ringlets upon the dark carpet on the floor. Before the bed knelt ' the conjurer—the head of the wounded woman rested upon his head, which he had buried deep in the bed-clothes.
"Is Fay asleep?" whispered the woman, almost inaudibly, as she weariedly opened her eyelids.
The conjurer lifted his head, and took her white hand between his own.
"Yes," murmured he, with lips contracted by pain. "The young lady of the house has taken her to sleep in her own room; she is lying there in a little white bed—our child is well taken care of, Meta, my sweet life."
With an unutterable expression of inward pain the woman looked upon her husband, from whose eyes glowed despair.
"Jasko, I am dying!" she sighed. The conjurer fell back upon the carpet, and writhed, as though suffering in-tensest bodily pain.
"Meta, Meta, do not go away from me!" cried he, beside himself.    "You are the light upon my dark pathway! You are the angel who has received in her own breast the thorns of my wretched calling that they might not touch me!   Meta, how can I live when you are no longer at my side, with your guardian eye and heart full of unspeakable love?   How am I to live, when I no longer hear your enchanting voice' nor see your heavenly smile?   How am I to live with the torturing consciousness that I have chained you to my side only to make you infinitely wretched?   O Thou God! who livest on high!   Thou canst not thrust me into such a hell!"    He wept softly.   "I want first to make up to you for the wrongs that I have done you, Meta.    I want to work for you, work honestly, even till I sweat drops of blood; I want to work with hoe and spade.    We would retire in peace and contentment to some lonely spot."   He tore from his shoulders a black velvet jacket, spangled thickly with gold.    "Away with this finery!   It shall never touch me again!   Meta, stay with me—we will begin a new life."
A painful smile flitted across the lips of his dying wife. With difficulty she raised her head; he pushed his arm underneath, and, with his left hand, pressed her face frantically to his breast.
"Jasko, compose yourself—be a man!" gasped she. Her head sunk lifelessly back, but again she opened her fast-fading eyes, and it seemed as though the parting soul once more clung desperately to its failing tabernacle—those lips, so soon to crumble into dust, must speak yet once a fain; the heart would not stand still and take with it under-ground the tortures of a mother's anxiety unexpressed.
"You are unjust to yourself, Jasko," said she, after a pause, during which she had once more rallied the remnants of her strength; "I have not been made wretched by your means. I have been loved with a love that seldom falls to the lot of woman, and these years of happy love outweigh a whole, long life-time. I knew that I was giving my hand to a man of low profession. To be your companion I cheerfully left my father's house, whence I was thrust, on account of my love. If shadows obscured my happiness, the blame attaches to myself alone, in that I overestimated my own strength, and pusillanimously broke down under the wretchedness of your position. Jasko," continued she, more softly, "thought exalts a man, so that his art, of whatever kind it may be, lifts him above the narrow-minded views of mankind; but a woman succumbs beneath the pin-pricks of a contemptuous treatment. Oh! Jasko, anxiety about Fay converts my dying hour, into one of terrible torture! I beseech you, keep the child apart from your calling!"
She caught hold of his hand and drew it to her. Her whole soul once more permeated those beautiful eyes, whose light was so soon to be quenched in the night of death.
I am making a hard request of you, Jasko!" continued she in pleading tones. "Part from Fay—give her into the care of plain, honest people, and let her grow up in the midst of quiet scenes of domestic life—promise me that, mine only beloved husband."
With a voice choked by grief, he gave the required promise. Then ensued a horrible night, for the death-struggle would not end; but when dawn burst through the window, cast its roses upon the corpse of a beautiful woman whose glorified features no longer gave any token of the struggles of those last, sad hours. Orlowsky had thrown himself upon the body, fast growing cold and stiff, and it took the united exertions of several men to drag him away, and remove him to another chamber.
On the third day, toward evening, the "actor's wife" was buried amid a vast concourse of people.    Compassionate hearts had covered her coffin with flowers; and among the respectable men of the town who walked in the procession was Hellwig.    The conjurer broke down completely when the first clods fell upon the coffin; but Hellwig, who stood beside him, supported him, and accompanied him back to the town.   He stayed several hours with the deeply bereaved mourner, who, until then, had rejected every attempt to console him, and had even tried to lay violent hands on himself.    Those who passed by the chamber of death, at times, heard a heavy groan from the unhappy man, or outbursts of passionate tenderness in response to the sweet prattle of a little child; the two sounded heartrending together—that tear-choked voice, and the silvery laughter of the child.
CHAPTER III.
THE evening was far advanced. A sharp, November wind swept through the streets, and the first snowflakes were drifting down upon roof and pavement, and upon the freshly made mound that arched above the young wife of the Pole.
A table was set in the dining-room of the Hellwig mansion. The knives and forks laid by the plates were of massive silver, and the white damask table-cloth was as glossy as satin, displaying the beauties of a gorgeous pattern. The lamp stood upon a little round sofa-table, behind which sat Mrs. Hellwig, knitting upon a long, woolen stocking. She was a large, broad-shouldered woman, just turned of forty. Perhaps in the flush of youth this face might have been beautiful, at least the profile had those classic outlines required by the laws of regular beauty; but power to charm, this woman could never have possessed. And so finely shaped and brilliant as her large eyes might have been, and however radiant her complexion, there must have been ever absent here that ineffable charm lent to the features by the in-dwelling of a sweet and loving spirit. How could this face have become so stony, unless through lack of inner warmth? Could it have been possible after a youth full of blessed giving and receiving, after the countless impulses and aspirations which life awakens in the sensitive soul, to look so frigid as did these cold, gray eyes? Her dark front hair was smoothed back in a strong, stiff line about the forehead, that was still white. The rest of her hair, on the other hand, vanished beneath a mull muslin cap of faultless purity. This covering to the head, and a black gown of studiously simple cut, with tight-fitting sleeves, and narrow white ruffles at the wrists, gave to her whole appearance a somewhat puritanical air.
Now and then a side-door was opened, and the wrinkled face of an old cook peered in curiously.
"Not yet, Fredericka!" said Mrs. Hellwig, each time in a monotonous tone, without looking up; but ever more rapidly flew the needles through her fingers, and a peculiar look of bitterness contracted her thin lips. The old cook knew perfectly that "the madame" was impatient; and delighted in stirring her up, so presently called into the room in a whining tone:
"Bless us—but where can the master be staying all this while! The steak is getting spoiled, and when am I to finish my work today?"
This remark, it is true, brought reproof upon her, for Mrs. Hellwig did not suffer the people around her to express their opinions unbidden; but she withdrew well satisfied to the kitchen, for all that she had been reproved, because she had spied the deep furrow between, her mistress's eyebrows.
At last the front door opened. The full, deep tones of the door-bell echoed through the entrance-hall.
Oh! the pretty ting-a-ling up there!" called out the clear voice of a child.
Mrs. Hellwig laid her knitting in a little basket before her, and arose from her seat. Surprise and astonishment chased away the expression of impatience—over the lamp she looked intently away to the door. Outside, somebody scraped his feet innumerable times upon the straw mat—that was her husband. Immediately afterward he entered the room, and with somewhat unsteady steps walked to his wife. He bore upon his arm a little girl that might have been about four years old.
"I have brought something home with me for you, Bridget dear,"said he, beseechingly, but hushed directly again, as his eye met that of his wife.
"Well?" asked she, without stirring a muscle.
"I bring you a poor child—"
"Whom does it belong to?" interrupted she, coldly.
"To that unhappy Pole, who lost his poor young wife in so horrible a manner. Dear Bridget, receive the little thing kindly!"
"For to-night only, you mean?"
"No; I have solemnly promised the man that the child shall be brought up in my own house."
He said these words rapidly and firmly, for some time they must be spoken.
His wife's white face was suddenly suffused with crimson, and her lips curled scornfully. She took one step forward and tapped upon her brow with her forefinger in a manner most maliciously suggestive.
"I am afraid it is not quite right with you here, Hell-wig," said she. And still her voice retained a composure, that just at this moment, was yet more insulting. "To expect such a thing from me, me? To think that I, who try to make my house a temple of the Lord, would take under my roof the progeny of a play-actor—this implies more than—simplicity.''
Hellwig started back, and lightning flashed from his usually kind eyes,
"You are mightily mistaken, Hellwig," continued she. "I shall not take into my house this child of sin—the child of an abandoned woman, who has so evidently been overtaken by the judgment of the Lord."
"So—is that your opinion, Bridget? Well, let me ask you, of what sin your brother had been guilty, when he was struck down in the chase by the shot of a careless sportsman? He had gone out in search of his own amusement—but this poor woman died in the discharge of a difficult duty."
The blood forsook his wife's face, and she suddenly turned as white as chalk. For one moment she was silent and lurkingly fixed her eye in astonishment upon her husband, who suddenly confronted her with such energy.
Meanwhile, the little girl, whom Hellwig had set down upon the floor, drew down her rose-colored hood, displaying the sweetest little head covered with nut brown curls; her mantle too fell off. How hardened must have been the heart of this woman, since she did not forthwith stretch out both arms and press the child caressingly to her breast! Was she utterly blind to the unspeakable fascination of the little creature, who tripped through the apartment upon the prettiest of little feet that ever wore baby shoes, and with wide-open eyes gazed about on her new surroundings? The pink flesh of her plump shoulders rose above a blue mousseline dress, the sash and hem of which were prettily embroidered—perhaps this decoration of her darling had been the last work of hands now stiffened in death.
But the elegance of the child's attire, the luxuriance of her natural curls, and graceful movements were precisely what excited this woman's ire.
"Not two hours would I put up with this will-o'-the-wisp," said she, suddenly, without taking the slightest notice of her husband's reprimand. "This forward little piece, with her wild hair and bare breast, is no fit inmate of our grave and sedate household—why it would be to open the floodgates to levity and folly. Hellwig, you certainly will not throw down this apple of discord between us, but see to it that the little thing be immediately carried back where she belongs."
She opened the door that led to the kitchen, and summoned the cook.
"Fredericka, put on that child's things again," was her order, pointing to the little girl's cloak and hood, that still lay on the floor.
"Go instantly back to the kitchen!" commanded Hell-wig, in a loud, angry voice, pointing to the door. The puzzled maid vanished.
''You drive me to extremities, Bridget, through your cruelty and hard-heartedness!" cried her imbittered husband. "Ascribe it then to yourself and your prejudices, if I now say things that otherwise should never have crossed my lips. To whom belongs the house, that you maintain, in most mistaken fashion, that you have erected into a temple of the Lord? To me. You, too, Bridget, came into this house as an orphan; in the course of years, have you forgotten this? And alas that I should say it! the more diligently you have worked upon this so-called temple of the Lord, and. the more frequently you take upon your lips the name of the Lord, together with Christian love and humility, the more haughty and hard-hearted you have become.    This house is my house, and the' bread that we eat I pay for; and so I declare decidedly that this child stays where it is.    And if your heart is too narrow and unloving to have motherly feelings toward the poor orphan, then I desire, at least, of my wife, that out of respect to my wishes, she extend to the child the womanly protection needed.    If you would not lose consideration in the eyes of our servants, give the requisite directions for the accommodation of the child—otherwise I shall give the orders myself."
Not a word more crossed his wife's pale lips. Any other would, at such a moment, have resorted to tears, the last refuge of impotence; but these cold eyes seemed to be perfect strangers to so sweet a source of relief. This perfect speechlessness, this icy coldness, in which the whole woman was enveloped, as in a panoply, had something alarming about it, and must have rent the bosom of anyone else. Silently she took up a bunch of keys and left the room.
With a deep sigh, Hellwig took the little girl by the hand, and walked up and down the floor with. her. He had fought a hard fight, in order to secure a home in his house for this forsaken creature. He had mortally offended his wife; never, never—he knew that—would she forgive him the bitter truths which he had just told her, for she was implacable.
CHAPTER IV.
MEANWHILE Fredericka set upon the table a little tin plate with a child's knife and fork and a clean napkin. At the same time there was a ring at the front door bell, and immediately afterward Henry opened the sitting-room door and admitted a little boy about seven years old.
"Good-evening, papa!" cried the little fellow, shaking the snow-flakes from his fur cap.
Hellwig took the fair head of his child tenderly between his hands and kissed him on the forehead. "Good-evening my boy," said he. "Well, have you had a fine time at your little friend's?" 
"Yes, but that stupid Henry brought me home entirely too early."
"It was by your mamma's desire, my boy.    Come here, Nathanael, look at this little girl—her name is Fay—" "Nonsense!   How can she be called ' Fay'?   That is no name!" Hellwig's eye scanned with emotion the little creature, around whom parental tenderness had sought to throw a poetical charm by the use of this pet name.
"Her mother called her so, Nathanael," said he, softly; "her real name is Felicia. Is she not a poor, poor thing? Her mamma has just been buried today; she is to live with us now, and you will have to love her as your own little sister, do you hear?"
"No, papa. I do not want any little sister." The boy was the very image of his mother. He had fine features, and a remarkably clear, rosy complexion; but he also had the ugly habit of pressing his chin against his breast, and from underneath his arched brows, rolling up his large eyes hi a sidelong manner, that gave him an expression of trickishness and cunning. At this instant he bowed his head lower than ever against his breast, pushed up his right elbow defiantly, and looked over at the child from under it with a mischievous expression.
The little girl stood there picking and pulling at her frock from embarrassment, for she was evidently awed by the presence of the boy who was considerably larger than herself, but she gradually came nearer, and, without seeming to be frightened by his repulsive attitude, with beaming eyes, caught at the child's saber which hung at his girdle. He thrust her back angrily, and ran to meet his mother, who just now re-entered the room.  "I do not want any little sister!" he repeated in a whining tone. "Mamma, send that naughty little girl away. I want to be alone with you and papa!"
Mrs. Hellwig silently shrugged her shoulders, and took her seat behind the supper-table.
"Pray Nathanael!" was the order she gave in a monotonous voice, folding her own hands, as she did so. Forthwith the boy's ten fingers were intertwined; he bowed his head humbly and said a long grace.    Under existing circumstances this prayer was the most abominable profaning of a beautiful Christian custom. The master of the house did not touch a morsel of food, his brow that was usually so pale, lay the flush of inward excitement, and while he mechanically played with his fork, his troubled glance passed uneasily from one to the other sullen countenances of the members of his family. The little girl, on the contrary, found her supper very good. Scrupulously she put into her little pocket some sugar-plums, which he had laid beside her plate.
"That is for mamma," said she, confidentially. "She is very fond of sugar plums, and papa is always bringing her whole boxes full of them."
"You have not got any mamma!" called out Nathanael, maliciously.
"Oh, you know nothing about it," retorted the little girl, very much excited. "I have a much prettier mamma than you have!"
Confounded, Hellwig glanced timidly across at his wife, and his hand rose involuntarily, as though he would lay it over the little rosy mouth that understood so poorly how to protect its own interests.
"Have you had a little bed fixed for her, Bridget?* asked he, hurriedly, but with soft, pleading voice.
"Yes."
"And where will she sleep?"
"With Fredericka."
"Would there not be room enough—at least for the first time—in our chamber?"
"If you want to put out Nathanael's bed, yes." He turned off indignantly, and called in the servant-maid.
"Fredericka," said he, "you are to have this child under your charge to-night; be good and kind to her, for she is a poor orphan, and accustomed to the tenderness of a good, gentle mother."
"I would not stand in the girl's way, Mr. Hellwig," answered the old woman, who had evidently been listening; "but I am the child of honest people, and never in all my life had anything to do with such people as play actors. If it could only be known first that these folks were lawfully married, that were but reasonable."
"This is too much!" cried the infuriated Hellwig. "Am I to learn today, for the first time, that in all my household not a spark of pity or compassion is to be found? And so you think you must be uncharitable because you are born of honest parents, Fredericka? Well, know for your satisfaction, then, that these people have lived in lawful wedlock; but I tell you, at the same time, that I shall henceforth deal very severely with you, if I find you guilty of the least unkindness to this child."
It seemed as though he were weary of this contest. He rose, and himself carried the little girl into the cook's chamber. She pleasantly allowed herself to be put to bed, and soon fell asleep, after she had prayed in a sweet voice for papa and mamma, the dear uncle who would take her back to mamma, tomorrow, and for the large lady with the bad face.
Late at night Fredericka came to bed. She was angry at having been obliged to stay up so long, and recklessly bustled about the room. Little Felicia was suddenly startled out of her sleep; she sat up in bed, pushed the tangled curls back from her forehead, and her wistful eyes roamed searchingly around over the smoky walls and mean furniture of that close and dimly lighted room. "Mamma, mamma!" she cried, in a loud voice. "Be quiet, child, your mother is not here; go to sleep again," said the cook, crossly, while she continued to undress herself.
The child looked across at her in affright, then began to cry softly; she was evidently frightened by her strange surroundings.
"There now, the little animal is howling; that was the one thing wanting—will you be quiet, you mean little brat!" so saying, she lifted up her hands in a threatening manner. The little girl hid her head in affright underneath the bed-clothes.
"Ah, mamma, dear mamma!" whispered she, " where are you now? Take me into your bed; I am so afraid. I will be just as pretty as can be, and go to sleep directly. I have put something away for you, too; I have not eaten all up. Fay saved some for you, dear mamma. Or please, just give me your hand, then I will stay in my own little bed, and—"
"Will you be still?" cried Fredericka, running up to the child's bed in a fury,
She did not stir again; only now and then a suppressed sob forced its way from beneath the covering.
The old cook had long slept the sleep of the righteous, when the poor child was still crying softly after her dead mother; for, once aroused, the keen longing for her could not be quieted in that little heart.
CHAPTER V.
HELLWIG was a merchant. The heir to a considerable fortune, he had yet augmented it by different industrial enterprises. He retired, however, quite early from business, on account of his delicate health, and lived upon his income in the small town of his nativity. The name of Hellwig carried weight with it in that community. From, time immemorial the family had been one of the most considerable in the place, and for many generations back some members of it had always been the incumbent of some high office in the town. The finest garden outside the gates of the little city, and the house on the market-place, had been in the possession of this same family as far back as the oldest inhabitant could remember. This house formed the corner of the market square and a steeply ascending street, and at this corner the stately front of the building rounded into an extensive balcony. In the' two upper stories, from one year's end to the other, snow-white blinds hung behind the windows; only three times a year, and then always a few days before the chief festivals of the church, these curtains vanished to give place to airing and scouring. The great brazen dragon-heads, high up on the roof, that spewed the rain from the gutters down upon the pavements, and the birds that fluttered by, these saw the accumulated treasures of the old mercantile house, saw the old-fashioned splendor of its apartments—those tall wardrobes of precious, inlaid work, with their shining locks and handles, the rich silk damask coverlets on the swelling down pillows of the couches, and the high-cushioned chairs, the Venetian mirrors, reaching to the ceiling and introduced into the walls, and the luxuriously made-up beds in the guest-chambers, whose linen sheets emitted a strong perfume of lavender.
These rooms were not occupied. It had never been the custom of the Hellwig family to let any portion of their spacious mansion. Through all time distinguished, solemn silence had reigned up here, only interrupted by a brilliant wedding or christening, and occasionally, in the course of the year, by the echoing foot-fall of the housekeeper, there kept locked up her stores of linen, silver, and chinaware.
Mrs. Hellwig had come into this house as a child of twelve. The Hellwigs were related to her, and gave her a home after both her parents had died, in quick succession, leaving her and her brothers and sisters in utterly destitute circumstances. The young girl had found it hard to please her old aunt, who was strict and proud. Hellwig the only of the house, at first felt compassion for her, but afterward his sympathy changed into love. His mother was decidedly opposed to his choice, and this gave rise to disagreeable scenes, but the lover finally carried his point and married the girl. Ho had mistaken the sullen reticence of his beloved for maidenly timidity, her coldness of heart for strictness of morals, her obstinacy for character, and was not disenchanted till after marriage. In a short time the good-natured man felt the iron gripe of a despotic spirit upon his neck, and where he had hoped for grateful devotion, he suddenly came face to face with the grossest selfishness.
His wife presented him with two children—little Nathanael and his brother John, who was about eight years older. The latter had been sent by Hellwig, when not more than eleven years old, to a relation, a learned man, who lived on the Rhine, and was the principal of a large academy for boys.
Such were Hell wig's family relations at the time when he took into his house the child of the conjurer. The terrible tragedy of which he had been an eye-witness had deeply moved him. He could not forget the pleading, unspeakably piteous glance of the unhappy woman, as she had stood humbled in his hall, and become the recipient of his dollar. When, therefore, the Pole had communicated to him the last wish of the deceased, he offered, without delay, to take the child and bring her up. Not until he had emerged into the dark street, followed by the echo of the wretched man’s heart-rending farewell, and the little one, folding her arms yet more firmly around his neck asked for her mama, did he think of the opposition that almost certainly awaited him at home; but he calculated upon the attractiveness of the child, and upon the fact that his own union had not been blessed with a daughter. In spite of all his bitter experiences, he had as yet no full conception of his wife's character, else he would have immediately retraced his steps and restored the child to its father's arms.
If the connection between Hellwig and his wife had been previously a frosty one, it would seem now, after the reception of the little orphan as an inmate of their family, as though granite walls had been built up between the married pair. To be sure everything in the house moved on in its accustomed way. Several times daily Mrs. Hellwig made a tour of inspection through house and store-rooms—and no fairy-like tread was hers; on the contrary, there was some-tiling that grated peculiarly on delicate nerves in the sound of her firm, hard step. She was perpetually passing her right hand over the furniture, window-sills, and balustrades —it was an irresistible propensity, a sort of mania with this woman, to feel over everything with the horny tips of her long white fingers, when she would carefully examine them, to see if an atom of dust, or displaced cobweb had not adhered to them. There was praying now as before, and the voices that lauded God's everlasting love, and tender mercy, and that repeated his command, which bids us love our enemies as ourselves, sounded just as mechanical and unmoved afterward as before. They took their meals together, and on Sunday the wedded pair walked side by side to church. Bat Mrs. Hellwig avoided speaking to her husband with iron consistency. She rebuffed any advances on his part in the most snappish manner, and somehow managed always to overlook her partner's diminutive figure. Just as completely did she ignore the existence of a certain little intruder's presence. On that stormy evening she had given orders to the cook, once for all, to prepare daily another portion of food, and likewise thrown to her materials for preparing another bed. Meanwhile the little trunk containing Felicia's possessions had been sent from The Lion, and Fredericka was made to open it in her mistress's presence, and hang in an open passage, to air, the very neatly kept little wardrobe inside, which emitted a very delicate perfume. Herewith began and ended her enforced attentions to the "actor's child," and after she had returned to the dining-room it was with the inward resolve to be quit of the same for all time to come. Only on one single occasion did it seem as if she felt the glimmering of a spark of interest on her behalf. It happened that one day a seamstress sat making two dark stuff dresses for Felicia, exactly after the severe cut adopted by the mistress of the house herself. At the same time Mrs. Hellwig squeezed the resisting child between her knees, and belabored her head so long with brush, comb, and pomatum, that finally that wonderful mass of ringlets obtained the wished-for smoothness and pliability, insomuch as to submit to being done up into two ugly, stiff plaits at the back of her head. The aversion of this woman to pleasantness and grace, in short to everything outside the limit of her own contracted views, and that took shape and form from the domain of the ideal, was so excessive, as to be yet stronger than her obstinacy, than her resolve completely to ignore the child as a member of her household. Hellwig could have wept when his little darling came to meet him thus disfigured; while his wife, after the sin so imperiously required by her sense of hatred to the beautiful, was, if possible, more scornfully oblivious of the child than before. For all this the little creature was not yet to be pitied; for beyond the reach of those Medusa eyes she could take refuge in one warm heart—Hellwig loved her as he did his own children. He did not, indeed, find courage to express this openly—his whole fund of energy, as regards opposition to his wife, had been exhausted on that eventful evening—but his eye watched over Felicia with, unremitting vigilance. Like Nathanael she had her little play-place in her adopted father's room; she could there pet her dolls, rock them to sleep with the melodies which she had learned at her mother's knees. Nathanael did not go to the public school: lie got his instruction from private tutors, under his father's eye, and when Felicia had attained her sixth, year, she shared the same advantages; but as soon as the snow melted, and crocuses and snowdrops broke the earth upon the otherwise still empty flower-beds, Hellwig took the children with him every day for a walk in his great garden. When it grew yet warmer they learned their lessons and played out-of-doors altogether, returning to the house on the Square only at meal-times. Mrs. Hellwig seldom entered the garden; she preferred sitting to knit in her large, quiet chamber, behind its spotlessly white, primly plaited curtains, and for this preference she had her own peculiar reasons. An ancestor of Hellwig's had laid off the garden in, old French style. It had surely been a masterly hand by which the mythological figures grouped around had been fashioned out of sandstone.    Their bright forms stood out in striking relief from their background of dark, stiff yew-trees.   The charming, but unconventionally nude, form of a Flora, the soft, bare shoulders of the struggling Proserpine and muscular nakedness of her powerful captor, could not fail to arrest the immediate gaze of whoever entered; and they were indeed stones of stumbling to Mrs. Hell wig.    In the beginning she had imperiously demanded the removal of this "sinful representation of the human body," but Hellwig saved his favorites by producing his father's will, in which the removal of the statues was expressly prohibited.    Hereupon Mrs. Hellwig had nothing more effective to do than to have set out a wilderness of climbing plants at the feet of these mythological apples of discord, so that it was not long before Pluto's grimy face was hidden beneath a venerable periwig of green.
One fine morning, however, Henry, in obedience to his master's orders, with veritable delight dug up the green parasites to the tiniest little shoots, and since that time Mrs. Hellwig had avoided the spot out of regard to her soul's interests, but yet more because the statues were the mocking witnesses of her defeat. But on this very account it had become the adopted home of little Felicia.
Behind the great wall of yew-trees stretched a magnificent expanse of greensward.   Gigantic walnut-trees buried their roots deep in the flower-spangled grass, and a rushing mill-course partly intersected the verdant plain; its borders were edged by a thick growth of hazel-bushes, and the small dam, which had been thrown up and sodded as a protection against the swelling floods of spring-time, glittered in May with golden cowslips, and later the bright-eyed little crimson pinks peeped out from among its nodding stalks.
Felicia never tired of learning, and sat still in study hours with remarkable self-control; but when late of an afternoon Hellwig would pronounce study hours at an end, she seemed suddenly to be entirely metamorphosed. Although still flushed with zeal for learning, she was like something mad, intoxicated, as it were, with freedom. She was never tired of racing aimlessly to and fro over the grass-plot, both aims flung high in the air, her movements as free and unrestrained as those of a young colt of the steppe. Then with the speed of lightning she would climb to the top of a walnut-tree, triumphantly dart her head out from her perch, her fair locks once more unbound and fluttering in the breeze—then again she would as suddenly throw herself down at full length by the side of the brook: there she would lie, her hands folded under her head, gazing up into the green canopy of gentle nestling leaves that arched overhead, and dreaming, dreaming  those bright, deceptions dreams of life and the future, such as all lively and intelligent children weave out of the materials furnished them by the fairy tales that they have heard, and the power of their own imaginations.    Below, the water glided monotonously by; the sunbeams sported upon its waves, and broken, penetrated through the dark hazel-bushes, like glowing eyes, half-veiled and breathing mysteries; bees and other insects buzzed by, and the butterflies that had fluttered until weary among the carefully tended exotics of the front garden, here found their promised land, and hung fearlessly upon the lips of the flowers, close by the cheek of the little maiden.
Shining little white clouds, too, of fantastic shape floated above the tree-tops—then all of a sudden an enigmatical past would rise up before the eyes of the deeply reflective child.    White and shining had also been her mother's robe; the wax-light had fairly mirrored itself in the milk-white luster of the material that had been draped about the supposed long, narrow bed, which had been strewn with lovely flowers. Felicia still wondered why they would not permit her, that time, to kiss her mamma awake, as she had always been accustomed.to do, in the morning, to their mutual merriment.    She did not know that her mother's bewitching countenance, which had always inclined toward her in passionate tenderness, had long been moldering underground.    Hellwig had never ventured to tell her the truth; for, although after the lapse of five years she no longer pined after her parents with abandonment of grief, yet she always spoke of them with affecting sensibility, and clung to her foster-father's ambiguous promise that she should some day meet her own dear ones again, with unshaken confidence.
Just as little did she know of her father's calling; he himself had desired it to be so, and therefore Hellwig had strenuously insisted that no one in the house should converse with the little girl on the subject of her past. It did not occur to him that the kindly veil which he was holding before her eyes might prematurely drop from his hand-—he, did not think of his own death. He was hopelessly consumptive, but, like all such invalids, he had the most sanguine expectations of recovery. Already he had to be wheeled in an arm-chair to his beloved garden—and yet he called this a passing weakness, which did not at all hinder him from sketching grand schemes of building and traveling.
One afternoon Dr. Bohm entered Hellwig's chamber. The patient sat at his desk writing diligently; divers cushions, which had been piled up behind his back, and on both sides of him in the easy-chair, held his emaciated figure erect.
"Halloa!" cried the doctor, as he threateningly shook his cane. "What an act of imprudence! Who in the world gave you leave to do this writing? Put that pen down this minute, if you please."
Hellwig turned around, a cheerful smile playing about, his lips. "Here is another example for you," answered he, sarcastically. "Doctor and death belong together. I am just writing to my son, John, about little Fay, and lo! I, who had never thought less of death in my life than today, at the very instant when you entered the house, happened to be penning this sentence."
The doctor stooped down and read aloud: "'I rely a great deal upon your character, John, and would therefore unconditionally transfer into your hands the charge of the child intrusted to me, in case that I should depart this life sooner than—'
"Enough, and now not one word further for today!" said the reader, as he opened a box, and deposited in it the half-finished letter. Then he proceeded, to feel the sick man's, pulse, and he gave a furtive look at the two bright red spots that glowed upon his sharply prominent cheekbones.
"You are just like a child, Hellwig," he scolded. "No sooner do I turn my back than you are at some folly."
"And you tyrannize over me most abominably. But just wait; by next May I'll be quite set up again, and then you may take a run into Switzerland on my account."
The next day the windows of the sick-room in the Hellwig mansion stood wide open. A penetrating odor of musk escaped thence into the street, and a man, clad in mourning suit, went his way through the city, in order to notify its" dignitaries, on behalf of the afflicted widow, that Mr. Hellwig had paid the debt of nature an hour ago.
Horrible contrast! Beside the shrunken features of the dead bloomed freshly cut flowers—young, innocent life, destined to premature decay—in honor of the dead.
Many people came and went, speaking softly, and moving with noiseless steps. He who lay there had been a wealthy, honored, and very generous man; but alas! he was now dead. The eyes of almost all bestowed a mere cursory glance upon the pale, distorted features of the corpse, while they could hardly be satisfied with gazing upon the circumjacent pomp—that last varnishing up of earthly glory.
Felicia cowered in a dark corner, behind several pails of oleander- and orange-trees. For two days she had not been permitted to see her uncle, his death-chamber having been kept fast locked, and now she knelt on the cold flag-stones, and gazed across at that utterly strange face, from which death had taken even its impression of unbounded good nature.
What had the child known of death?    She had been near him in his last moments, and yet had not understood that, with the stream of blood issuing from his lips, suddenly all must end.    He had fastened his eyes upon her with an indescribable expression, when she had been sent out of the room.    In the street outside she had run to and fro, full of anxiety, and angry at seeing his windows wide open—she knew how he dreaded any little draft of air, and now they were so regardless of him in there. She had been surprised, when evening came, by finding that no fire was kindled in his room, and to her oft-repeated entreaty to be allowed to carry in a lamp to her uncle, together with his tea, Fredericka had impatiently replied: "What is the matter with the child?    Are you crazy, or cannot you understand the meaning of plain language?   He is dead, I tell you—dead!" And now that she did see him again, he was so altered that she would never have recognized him—and thus the child began to comprehend what death is. Whenever a fresh stream of inquisitive visitors filled the hall, Fredericka came out of the kitchen holding the end of her apron before her eyes, and extolled the virtues of the man whom she had tried to worry as much as she could.
"Only to behold that girl!" she had exclaimed with burst of indignation upon discovering Felicia's pale little face, with dry, burning eyes peeping forth from among the orange-trees.    "Why, she has not been seen to shed a single tear!—the ungrateful little thing!   She cannot have a spark of love in her whole body!"                  
"You never loved him and you cry, Fredericka," retorted the little one cuttingly, but with an utter despondency of tone, as she withdrew yet further into her corner. Gradually the hall became empty.     Instead of those spectacle-loving specimens of the lower classes, who now posted themselves on the square outside, in order to have a view of the funeral procession, there now appeared fins black-coated gentlemen, who went (after a short pause beside the coffin) into the drawing-room, in order to express their sympathy with the widow.    In the vast, lofty hall reigned a momentary silence, which might have been termed a solemn one if it had not been interrupted here and there by the buzz of voices whispering in the room adjoining. All of a sudden little Felicia was roused from her reverie and gave a terrified look at the glass door leading into the yard. There, behind its panes of glass, appeared a remarkable face—here he lay still, with his deeply sunken eyes and that unfamiliar -look about his firmly closed mouth, and yet again there he was looking doubtfully into the empty hall standing there again with his own benignant expression of countenance, although his head did seem to be wrapped about in singular fashion.    Almost specter-like was the impression made, as the door-knob was lightly turned, an«| immediately afterward the door noiselessly opened.    The singular apparition stood upon the threshold.    Yes, those features strikingly resembled Hellwig's, and yet they were those of a woman, a little old lady, who slowly advanced toward the coffin, clad in a garb cut in a style long since discarded by the world of fashion.    A so-called gored dress, made of heavy black silk, but without plait or flounce, fitted closely to a very thin, angular figure; it was short, and displayed a pair of marvelously small feet, that now, however-stepped rather unsteadily.    Above her forehead curled a quantity of neatly arranged snow-white ringlets, and over these lay a sheer, black lace kerchief, that was tied under her chin.
The child who sat there motionless, gazing up at her in breathless astonishment, was not observed by the old lady, who now drew near the coffin. She started back, evidently shocked by the dead man's aspect, and, as though unconsciously, she lot fall from her left hand a bouquet of costly flowers upon the breast of the corpse. For an instant she hid her face in her pocket-handkerchief, but then deeply moved, laid her right hand, in solemnly beseeching manner, upon the cold brow of the departed.
"You know now, how it all happened, Fritz, do you not?" she whispered. "Yes, you know it, know it as your father and mother have known it long ago! I have forgiven you, Fritz—you did not know that you were being guilty of injustice! Sleep well—sleep well!"
Once more she took the waxen fingers of the deceased between her two hands; she then stepped back, and would have retired as noiselessly as she had entered, but precisely at this moment the drawing-room door opened, and Mrs. Hellwig stepped out. Her face looked whiter than marble beneath her black crape cap, but the immobility of her features was manifested more sharply than ever before— one might have scanned those eyes in vain for the slightest trace of tears that had been shed. She held a thick wreath of dahlias in her hands, evidently to lay upon the coffin, as a last "gift of love." Her surprised look met that of the old lady. The two stood for a moment as if rooted to the ground, but an unholy light began to glow in the eyes of the widow, her upper lip was slightly drawn up and revealed one of her white front teeth—in this expression there lurked something like an inextinguishable thirst for revenge. The features of the old lady, too, worked from vehement agitation, and she seemed to struggle against an unspeakable repugnance, but she conquered it, and with a soft, tearful glance at the deceased, she held out her right hand to Mrs. Hellwig.
"What do you want here, aunt?" asked the widow shortly, while she completely ignored the advance made on the old lady's part.
"Bless him!" ran her mild reply.
"The blessing of the unbelievers is of no effect."
"God hears it; His eternal wisdom and love regard not the wretched form if it only proceeds from a faithful heart."
"And from a sin-burdened soul!" chimed in Mrs. Hellwig, with biting sarcasm.
The old lady straightened herself up haughtily.
"Judge not," she began, solemnly, lifting up her forefinger in a threatening manner—" but no," she interposed with indescribable mildness, as she again looked toward the dead, "not one word more shall disturb your sacred peace Farewell, Fritz!"
With lingering step she retreated to the yard and vanished behind a door, that Felicia, up to this time, had always found locked.
Pretty bold that of the Old Ma'm'selle," sneered Fredericka, who, from the kitchen door had been a witness of the foregoing scene.
Mrs. Hellwig silently shrugged her shoulders, and laid her wreath at the feet of the corpse. She was not yet mistress of her inward excitement. However little practiced were this woman's features in the expression of womanly sensibilities, however rigid and unmoved, too, in their iron severity, they were animated enough where hatred and contempt were concerned. Whoever had once seen the evil smiles, that, at such moments, wrinkled the corners of her mouth, could never more trust the repose of that countenance.
She bent over the deceased, apparently in order to alter something in the arrangement; in so doing, her hand struck against the old lady's bouquet. It rolled over the edge of the coffin, and fell again at Felicia's feet.
The clock out-of-doors struck three. Several priests in their robes entered the hall; the gentlemen, too, came out of the drawing-room, followed by Nathanael, having at his side an overgrown, gawky young man. The widow had caused the news of his father's death to be conveyed to her son John by telegram, and this morning he had come in order to be present at the funeral. Little Felicia for an instant forgot her grief, and gazed, with all the curiosity natural to her age up at him, who had been his father & favorite. Was he really weeping behind the long, thin, but neatly kept hand, that he had drawn over his eyes at sight of the departed? No, not a tear rolled down, and an unpracticed eye like that of the child could discern, on that earnest face no sign of sensibility save an unusual pallor.
Nathanael stood beside him. He shed many tears, but his trouble did not hinder him from giving his brother a push and softly whispering to him, as he caught sight of Felicia in her hiding-place. John's glance followed the direction of his brother's forefinger. For the first time those eyes were riveted upon the child's face—they were dreadful eyes, grave, moody, without the light of kind feeling and inward warmth. In their Bible there was a picture of the Evangelist, "whom Jesus loved," having a fair, sweet countenance, with features almost feminine in their delicacy—"that is John on the Rhine," she had always insisted, and her uncle had smilingly assented. Ah! but they had nothing in common with one another, those lovely features encircled by beautiful bright hair, and this head with its thin, closely cropped hair, and deeply grave, pallid and irregular profile.
"Go away, child, you are in the way here," had been his stern command when he saw that preparations were being made to shut up the coffin.
Mortified and frightened, as though she had deserved to be punished, Felicia forsook her corner, and, unseen by the rest, slipped into her adopted father's former apartment
Now she cried bitterly. She had never been in his way! Again she felt his feverish hand upon the crown of her head, and heard his kind, feeble voice, as in those last days, whisper:
"Come, Fay, my child, I feel so well when you are by me!"
Hark! what hammering was that outside. It echoed harshly through the room with its lofty ceiling, where few of the many people present dared even whisper. Felicia furtively lifted up the green curtain and looked out into the hall.
Horrible! her uncle's form had disappeared from view; that black cover there lay on his dear face, and would hold him forever fast in that constrained posture. Why, if he were to move his hand ever so little, it would strike against the hard boards, so firmly joined together—and there was that man hammering again, and shaking the cover to see if it fitted close, or if he could thrust in his hand. There, in the darkness of that narrow chest—there, where there was no room to breathe, where he must be so fearfully lonesome. The little creature shrieked aloud for horror.
All eyes turned to the window in astonishment, but Felicia saw only that pair of large gray ones, whose glance had so shocked her a little while before. He looked over reprovingly; she left the window, and took refuge behind the great green curtain that divided the room into two halves. There she cowered down, looking timidly toward the door, through which he would certainly enter, and send her out after he had scolded her severely.
In her hiding-place she neither saw how the pall-bearers took the coffin upon their shoulders, nor how her uncle departed from his house forever. She did not see the long, dismal procession that followed the deceased like last shadows on his now completed path of life.
There, at the corner, a breeze blew up all the rich, white satin ribbons that hung down from the coffin. They fluttered up high. Was it a last greeting from the deceased to the forsaken child, whom a tenderly anxious mother had snatched away from the deep sloughs of its father's course of life, in order to cast it unconsciously upon a bare and inhospitable strand?
CHAPTER VI.
THE murmur of voices in the hall had suddenly hushed, and there ensued a profound silence. Felicia heard the house-door lock, but she did not know that herewith closed the drama in the hall. As yet she did not venture forth from her corner. She sat in the little cushioned arm-chair that had been given to her by her uncle last Christmas-eve, and her little head rested on both hands, which were crossed on the table. Her heart no longer beat so tumultuously, but her temples throbbed, and thoughts chased each other through her brain with feverish rapidity. She thought, too, about the little old woman, whose bouquet lay on the flag-stones outside, and had probably been trodden under foot by the heedless people. This, then, was that "Old Ma'm'selle,'' the recluse of the little chamber under the roof, at the rear of the house, who had ever been an apple of discord between Henry and the cook. According to Fredericka's say, the Old Ma'm'selle had some terrible load on her conscience.    She had been to blame for her father's death.   This terrific tale had filled little Felicia with horror and dread; but it was all over with this now.    That little lady with the kind face and eyes full of soft tears could never have been one to kill her father! No. Henry was certainly right, when, on the other side, he had obstinately maintained, with a wise shake of his head, that there was some other explanation of that strange affair.
Years ago, the Old Ma'm'selle had also lived in the front part of the house, but as the old cook expressed it with indignation ever bursting forth afresh, "but she could never be cured of playing lively tunes and singing unholy songs of a Sunday afternoon."    "The madame" had laid plainly before her the enormity of her offense, but it was all in vain, until at last nobody in the house could stand the abomination any longer, when Mr. Hellwig felt constrained to carry out his wife's wishes, and the Old Ma'm'selle had been obliged to betake herself to the attic.    There Fredericka agreed that she was perfectly inoffensive, and she must do her the justice   to say that now they never even heard the sound of the scouted piano in the house.    At all events her uncle must have been very much provoked with the Old Ma'm'selle, for he had never mentioned her; and yet she was his father's sister and looked so very like himself. A burning desire took hold of little Felicia at the thought of this resemblance—she wanted to mount to that garret, but there was that dreadful John; the child trembled with apprehension—and then the Old Ma'm'selle was shut in by bars and bolts the whole year round.
At the end of a long, remote corridor, close to the stairway that led up from the lower stories, was a door.    Nathanael had once whispered to her, when they had been playing up there together, "Look here, somebody lives up Then beating upon the door with both fists, he had shouted: "Come down, you old hag!" and then had dashed down-stairs, as if witches had indeed been after him.   How little Felicia's heart did beat that time, from fear and dread!   For not one second had she doubted but that a frightful woman, with a huge knife in her hand, would rush out and seize her by the hair of her head.
Gradually twilight fell.  The last golden gleam of autumn sunshine had vanished from the cross on the gable, and the house-clock in the room where she sat struck five slowly and with a mighty clangor—in the same slow, monotonous fashion had it rattled out those three strokes, which gave the signal for the bearing forth of its former owner, whom it had served punctually, and with loving foresight, lo! these many years. Until this time stillness had reigned throughout the entire mansion; but now the drawing-room door was suddenly opened, and hard, firm steps echoed through the hall. Felicia anxiously drew the curtain closely about her, for Mrs. Hellwig was coming into her uncle’s room. This seemed wondrously strange to the child, toil in her husband's life-time, it had never happened that the large woman crossed the threshold. She entered with an unusually quick step, lightly drew the night-latch, and then paused for a minute, in the middle of the room. It was with a look of unutterable triumph that this woman slowly surveyed premises which she had so long carefully shunned.
Above Hellwig's desk hung two beautifully painted portraits in oil—the likenesses of a lady and gentleman.    The former wore a proud look, her eyes flashing with wit and animal spirits, while her garb was of that style which so unbecomingly seeks to imitate that of the old Greeks.   The short waist, incased in glistening white silk, was shortened still more by a red girdle embroidered in gold; the bust and upper part of the arm, formed almost too voluptuously and only slightly covered, in the free display made of their beauty, did not harmonize at all with the modest, unpretending little bunch of violets that stuck in her belt—this was Hellwig's mother.
The widow now stood before this picture; for a moment she seemed to gloat over it.    Then she mounted upon a chair, lifted it down from the place which it had occupied for so many long years, and cautiously, without making much noise, knocked in a new nail, between the two old ones, on which she hung the other portrait, which was that of Hellwig's father.    It looked lonely now, while the despoiler left her elevated stand, and, with the lady's portrait in her hand, went out of the room.    Felicia's ear followed her steps intently, as she passed through the hall, and over the first step; higher and higher she mounted the echoing staircase, apparently up to the highest story.
She had not closed the door perfectly behind her, and after her last step had died away, Henry's shy face appeared in the chink.
"Here we have it, Fredericka," he called tack into the all, in a voice that was muffled, it is true, bat nevertheless expressive of horror.
"Verily and truly, it was the portrait of our sainted old mistress herself!"
The old cook burst the door wide open and peeped in. "My goodness, but the man is telling but the truth!'' cried she, striking her hands together.  "Ah! if that proud woman could but know it, it would make her turn over in her grave—and the blessed master none the less!—but then, she was shockingly dressed—her bosom so bare—it was enough to make a Christian blush!" "Do you think so?" returned Henry, blinking his eyes slyly. "Let me tell you a thing or two, Fredericka," he continued, laying the forefinger of his right hand astride of his left thumb.    "The old mistress would not hear to our master taking up with the 'madame;' this the 'madame' cannot forget, in the first place.    In the second place she was a jovial soul, who loved company, and was in the midst of every merry-making; and, in the third place, she called our 'madame' an unfeeling hypocrite.    Do you hear anything?"
In the course of Henry's demonstration Felicia had issued from her hiding-place. The child felt instinctively that from henceforth she would have no friend to look to in the whole house but this rough, yet thoroughly kind-hearted old fellow. He loved her dearly, and to his ever-watchful eyes she was mainly indebted for having hitherto been kept in blissful ignorance as to her past.
"Why, little Fay, is that you?" said he kindly, clasping her hand firmly within his own brawny right hand. "I have been looking all about for you. Come with me down into the servants' room, for you will not be suffered here my longer, poor thing; if the old pictures have to get out of the way, why then—''
He sighed and pressed the door to.    Fredericka had already made haste into the kitchen, for Mrs. Hellwig's steps re heard descending the stairs.
Felicia looked timidly around the front hall—it was empty; there, where the coffin had stood, lay flowers and leaves, strewed about the floor.
"Where is uncle?" asked she in a whisper, as she suffered Henry to lead her to the servants' room, without making the least resistance,
"Well, you see they have carried him away; but you know, my dear, he is in heaven now; ho is we there, better than on earth," answered Henry, sadly.  He took his cap from its nail and went out to execute a commission in the town.
In the servants' room darkness already prevailed. Henry left Felicia knelt on the wooden bench that along beneath the windows, and away beyond the houses of the steep, narrow street, gazed fixedly up at the little strip of dark blue sky discernible, where her uncle must now be.    She started with affright when Fredericka entered with the kitchen lamp.    The old cook set on the table a plate containing a slice of buttered bread.
"Come here, child, and eat.    Here is your supper." said she.
The little girl came nearer, but she did not touch the food; she only put out her hand for her slate, which Henry had brought over from her uncle's room, and began to write. Now came quick steps through the adjoining kitchen and immediately afterward Nathanael stuck his flaxen head in through the open door.    Felicia trembled, for hl always very rude when he found himself alone with her.
"Ah, there sits Miss Fay!" cried he, in a tone Felicia greatly dreaded in him. "Do you hear, you ill-mannered thing? where have you been hidden away all this while?"
"In the green chamber," answered she, without looking up.
"You had better not try that again!" said he, threateningly.    "You are to have no place there any more, for my mamma said so.    What is that you are writing there?"  "My task for Mr. Richter." "Mr. Richter, indeed!" repeated he, at the same wiping out, with a swift movement, what she had written on the slate.    "So you imagine that mamma would be silly enough to go to the expense of paying a high price; you to take private lessons, do you?    She will see to that sort of thing being stopped.    You can now go back the place you came from; afterward you will be just what your mother was, and then they will do so to you. And he laid his hand against his cheek, and went through the pantomime of   shooting,   winding   up with a   shout   of "bang!"
The little girl stared at him with wide open eyes.    He spoke of her dear mother—that could never have been; but that lie said sounded so unintelligible.
"You know nothing about my mamma,'' said she, unsteadily, but in the tone of a question, while it seemed as though she held her breath.
"Oh! I know a great deal more about her than you do!" replied he, adding after a, pause, while he   leered at her maliciously from under his bent brow, "I bet you do not know who your parents were."
The little girl shook her head with a sweet look of innocence, but at the same time fastened her eyes on his lips with an expression of anxious entreaty.    She knew this boy's ways much too well not to apprehend that something coming now that would grieve her to the quick. "They were play-actors!" he shrieked with scornful intonation. "Such people, you know, as we have seen on fair days—they play tricks, dance the tight-rope, and all manner of such things,  and  afterward  carry the  plate around and beg.''
The slate fell to the ground and was broken into small bits.   Felicia had jumped up, and as though perfectly beside herself, rushed past the   startled boy out into the kitchen. 
"He is lying, oh! say that he is lying, Fredericka?" she cried out in cutting accents, as she seized the cook's arm. 
"I cannot just exactly say that, but he has exaggerated," replied Fredericka, whose heart did feel a touch of human sympathy upon sight of the fearfully agitated child. "Beg they did not, but play-actors they were—that much is true."
"And very poor acting they did," chimed in Nathanael, as he stepped up to the hearth and looked inquiringly into Felicia's face.
She was not crying yet—no indeed, on the contrary, she gave him such a fierce look from her flashing eyes that he fell into a regular rage.
"They played cruel tricks!" repeated he. "Your mother tempted the Lord her God, and therefore, she did not get to heaven—my mamma said so."
"She is not dead at all!" gasped Felicia. Her pale mouth quivered from agitation, and her hand convulsively clutched at the skirt of the old cook's gown.
"Indeed she is, though, you silly thing—she died long, long ago—only papa, who is in heaven now, would never let anybody tell you about it. Why, she was shot dead by a soldier over there in the town-hall while she was acting a part."                                                                          
The tortured child uttered a heart-rending shriek, as Fredericka had nodded her head in token of assent at those last words, so that what he had said could not be utterly false.
Just at this moment Henry returned from, the execution of his errand, and no sooner had the broad shouldered figure of the house-servant appeared upon the threshold than Nathanael slipped out of the room. Mean natures instinctively shrink from standing face to face with a man of upright, honest mind. The cook's conscience began to prick her too, and she busied herself unremittingly about the hearth.
Felicia did not repeat her scream. With face turned to the wall she pressed her head against her uplifted and clasped hands, but her whole frame shook with the vehemence of her suppressed sobs.
But the child's piercing shriek had penetrated to front hall, and been heard by Henry; he saw, moreover how Nathanael vanished behind the room-door, and immediately knew that some villainy had been practiced.
Without saying a word he drew the little girl away from the wall and lifted up her face—it was frightfully distorted. At sight of him the child once more broke out into loud weeping, and amid her sobs, gasped out these words:
"They shot my poor little mother dead—my dear, good mamma!"                                                                                    
Henry's broad, good-natured countenance turned quite pale through excess of indignation—he seemed to choke down a muttered curse.
"Who has told you this?" asked he, casting a threatening glance at Fredericka.                                             
The child was silent, but the cook began to recite what had just passed, at the same time that she poked the fire, basted over again the meat that was already basted, and did various other unnecessary things, in order to avoid meeting Henry's eyes.
"Yes, I do think that Nathanael might just as well not have told her just today," she wound up finally, "but tomorrow or day after tomorrow the madame is going to take her in hand, and you may be sure that she will handle her without gloves—you may just count upon that." Henry led Felicia into the servants' hall, took his seat side her on a stone bench, and sought to comfort her, in so far as he could, with his uncouth mode of speech.    He told her of the horrible accident at the town-hall, while he spared her feelings as much as possible, winding up finally saying that her mamma did indeed look like an angel, as everybody said at the time, and was doubtless now in heaven, whence she could watch over her little Fay.    He then tenderly stroked the child's head, as she burst forth again into convulsive weeping.
CHAPTER VIL
ON the next morning, the ringing of church-bells resounded solemnly through the city. Up the steep, narrow street worshipers were streaming toward the Church of the Apostles, situated on the brow of the lull. Velvet, silk, and materials of less costly description, but suited for Sun-lone the less, were worn in that church, not only to honor God, but also to be seen of one's neighbor.
A little tiny figure, covered up in black, crept forth from the stately mansion situated on the corner of the marketplace,
Nobody would have recognized the light, graceful form if Felicia under that great, heavy veil, which was secured by a pin underneath her chin.    Fredericka had wrapped the coarse, ugly garment about the little girl, remarking emphatically that the madame had been good enough to give her that nice cloth for mourning; she had then opened the front door and sternly enjoined it upon the child, who was hurrying out, by no means to go as usual into the family pew—the place for her was upon the bench with the school-children.
Felicia hugged her hymn-book close under her arm, and quickly turned the corner.    It was evident that she struggled impatiently to move forward; but the sight of three figures across the way, clad in black and moving along at solemn, measured pace, forthwith caused her to slacken her speed. Yes, there she went; that large woman between her two sons, and all the people that met them bowed low and respectfully. It is true that the whole year through she had hardly had a pleasant look to bestow upon a human being, and her mouth had often opened in harsh speech to . those who had sought aid of her, and the smaller boy there, on her left hand, had beaten and kicked the beggar children who had ventured into the house. He lied abominably, too, and then swore solemnly that he had not lied— but what did all this matter? They were going to church now; to seat themselves in their closely locked pew, behind polished panes of glass, and would pray to God, and He would love them and take them to His heaven—for they were no play-actors.
The three figures vanished inside the church-door. The child followed them with anxious eyes, then slipped by, past all those open doors, whence proceeded already the organ's tones, and through which she obtained a glimpse of the magical gloom of the interior and the closely packed rows of worshipers. But the organ's tones pealed forth in vain, so far as was concerned the wildly throbbing heart of the child, that hurried by on the outside. She could not pray to God today—for He would have nothing to do with her poor, murdered mamma—He had not taken her into His great, blue sky—she was lying all alone out in the grave-yard, and there the child must go to visit her.
Felicia turned into a second street, that was yet steeper than the one running along by their house. Then came the ugly city-gate, with the still uglier tower, by which it was surmounted; but through the arched gate-way it looked invitingly green. There an avenue of magnificent, well-trimmed linden-trees wound around the blackened old town walls, forming a wonderful contrast, like a wreath of fresh myrtle around a hoary head. How solemnly quiet it was up here!
The child was frightened at her own footsteps, beneath which the gravel grated—and no wonder! for she was treading upon a forbidden path. But she ran ever faster, and finally stood still before the entrance to the graveyard, where she paused to take breath.
Never yet had Felicia set foot upon this quiet spot. She knew nothing as yet of those uniform little lots parceled off so monotonously side by side, nor of those stone slabs underneath which life in its many forms lay suddenly extinct. Two large elder-bushes stretched out their branches at the side of the black-trellised gate, bowed down by the weight of their clusters of shining black berries, and further on arose the gray walls of an old church. All this looked gloomy, but over yonder extended a broad plain, studded with flowers of many colors, and shrubs, all aglow in the mild radiance of autumn sunshine.
"Whom have you come to see, my dear?" asked a man in his shirt-sleeves, who stood leaning against the door of the house for the reception of the dead before interment, and who puffed blue clouds from his tobacco-pipe into the clear atmosphere.
"My mamma," answered Felicia, hastily, as she cast a searching glance over the great field of flowers.
'"That indeed—is she here already?    "Who was she, though?"
"She was the wife of an actor."
"Ah, the one who was shot at the town-hall about five years ago? There she lies close by the corner of the church."
There now stood the little forsaken creature before that spot of earth that covered the object of all the sweet dreams of her childish heart!    All around lay decorated graves, most of them so completely covered with gay asters, that it seemed as though the angels had been robbing the sky of its stars, in order to do honor to these beloved ones.    Only the narrow strip of ground, at the child's feet, was brown and bare, of all save dry grass mingled with the rank growth of a noxious weed.    Heedless feet had already worn a path directly over it; the earth, which had been spongy in the beginning, and beaten upon by violent rains, was deeply sunken, and with it the white, tasteless stone at the head of the neglected grave—" Meta d'Orlowsky," printed in large, black letters, was in close juxtaposition to the ground.   By this stone Felicia cowered down, and her little hands worked impulsively in a spot bare of grass—earth, nothing but earth!    This heavy, senseless mass lay upon the tender face, on the dear form in its robe of glistening white satin, and on the flowers in her lily-white, waxen hands. Now, the child knew that her mother had not merely been asleep that time.
"Dear mamma," she whispered, "you cannot see me, but I am here by you! And if our dear Lord even will have nothing to do with you—for He has not sent you one single little flower—and nobody troubles themselves about you, I love you and will always come to you! I will love nobody else but you, not even our Father in heaven, if He is so stern and harsh to you!"
Such was the child's first outcry at the grave of her calumniated mother. A light breeze passed by, that was soft and cooling, as though a mother's soothing hand had indeed been laid in blessing upon the throbbing temples of her suffering darling. The asters nodded kindly to the mourning child, and the grass, too, seemed to murmur in sympathy, as its dry blades waved gently to and fro; and the sky arched overhead in transparent clearness—that everlasting, unchangeable sky, which is turned into a wrestling-place for human passions by the vain imaginations of mankind.
Afterward, when Felicia returned to the sad house on the Market Square—the child did not know how long she had sat dreaming out there in that broad field, sacred to the dead—she found the house-door ajar and slipped in, but forthwith paused in affright at the nearest corner, for the door to her uncle's room stood wide open, and she could hear issuing from it the sound of John's voice, as well as his firm, slow tread, as he walked up and down.
However fierce had been the fit of rebellion which had come over the little girl since yesterday, her dread of that calm, cruelly cold voice, and those inexorable gray eyes, was yet greater. She could not possibly come within reach of that half-open door—her little feet stuck fast, as though rooted to the flag-stones.
"I agree with you perfectly, mamma," said John from within, as he paused in his walk; "it were far better for this troublesome little creature to be brought up in the family of some honest tradesman; but this unfinished letter here is just as binding upon me as a valid testament. Once my father said that he would not on any account have denied to the child the protection of his house—it is just as if my father himself repeats the demand—and here with these words, 'I would therefore unconditionally transfer to yon the charge of the child intrusted to my care,' he unquestionably constitutes me the executor of his will. It does not at all become me to find fault in anywise with my father's modes of action; but if he had known how unspeakably opposed I am to the class of people whence this child has sprung, lie would have spared me this guardianship."
"You do not know what you are asking of me, John!" replied the widow in a tone of greatest vexation. "For five long years I have been obliged to submit in silence to having this foundling, this God-forsaken creature about me—I can stand it no longer."
"Well, we have no way out of it, then, than an appeal to the child's father."
"Yes, and there you may appeal," answered Mrs. Hell-wig, with a short, scornful laugh. "He thanks God for relieving him of a brat to feed! Dr. Bohm tells me that, so far as lie knows, the man did write, in the beginning, one single time, from Hamburg. Since then not another word has been heard from him."
"But, as a good Christian, mamma, you will at least admit that the child ought not to be sent back to a place where her soul would be surely lost."
"It is as good as lost anyhow."
"No, mamma! Although I will not deny but that the taint of such blood is hard to eradicate, yet I firmly believe in the blessing of a good education."
"You actually mean, then, that we are to go on paying hard money, for years to come, in behalf of a creature that is nothing in the wide world to us? She has lessons in French, drawing—"
"Heaven forbid! I meant nothing of the sort," cried John, interrupting her reckoning—his monotonous voice, for the first time, acquiring a touch of liveliness. "I was not thinking of such a thing," repeated he. "This modern female education is, at all times, my abomination. Such women as you, who, with genuine religion and true womanliness, never overstep the limits prescribed for them, are becoming every day more rare. No, indeed, all that sort of thing ceases from this day forth. Educate the girl usefully, for what is to be her ultimate destiny—domestic service. I refer the matter wholly and solely to yourself. With your strong will, your Christianity—"
Here the door was suddenly burst wide open, and Nathanael sprung out, being probably weary of the dialogue. I
"Hiding, eh? but never mind, miss, it will not do you the least bit of good!" cries he, and, in pursuance of his mischievous intent, squeezed her tender wrist so hard that she screamed. "Now, you just come and tell mamma the text of the sermon, this very minute! I caught you, miss, you were not on the school-children's bench; I'm certain of that. And only to see what a figure you cut. Do, please, mamma, just look at this frock!"
With these words he drew the little girl to the door, while she resisted with all her might.
"Come in, child!" said John in a tone of command from his station in the, middle of the room, where he still remained holding his father's letter in his hand.
Felicia crossed the threshold with a lingering step. For one minute she lifted her eyes to the tall, spare form in front of her. Not a particle of dust was adhering to his fine, black suit, and his linen was of spotless purity; not a stray hair was to be seen on his brow, across which he passed his hand repeatedly, with a look almost of distress. Everything about him was painfully neat and exact. He looked with a sort of abhorrence upon the hem of the child's dress.
"Where did you get that?" asked he, pointing to the spot which had attracted his gaze.
The little girl timidly looked down—it did indeed look badly. The grass had been wet with dew out there, and when she had thrown herself down on the grave, she had not thought about the probability of such striking marks being left upon her black raiment. She stood before him silently with downcast eyes. 
"What, no answer? You have a bad conscience, apparently—so you were not at church; how was that?"
"No, I was not," said the little girl.
"And where were you, then?"
She was silent. She would rather have submitted to the severest beating than pronounced her mother's name in this presence.
"I'll tell you, John," answered Nathanael, in her stead: "she was out in our orchard stealing fruit. She is forever at that."
Felicia darted at him a sparkling glance, but her lips did not open. "Answer," said John dictatorially.  "Is Nathanael right?"
"No, he lied, as he always does," replied the child firmly.
At this instant John quietly stretched out his arm in order to restrain Nathanael, whose impulse was to rush upon his accuser, like a wild beast.
"Touch her not, Nathanael," was Mrs. Hellwig's order to the boy. Until then she had sat silently in her husband's arm-chair. Now she rose up. "Whew! what a dark shadow the huge woman cast over the room.
"You will believe me, John," said she, turning to her son, "when I assure you that Nathanael never uttered an untruth. He is pious, and lives in the fear of the Lord, as is seldom the case with a child I have watched over and guided him, that will be enough for you. Now comes all that was lacking, in that this miserable creature has sown dissension between brethren, as she has already done between their parents. Is it not unpardonable in itself, that, instead of going to church, she should be wandering about to other places?—no matter where."
With freezing glance her eyes transfixed the little maid, who stood trembling before her. "Where is the new veil that was given you this morning?" asked she suddenly.
Felicia started, and felt for the missing article. Oh, heavens! it was gone. She must have dropped it in the church-yard! She immediately felt convicted of an act of gross carelessness—she was heartily ashamed of, herself, and her lips were about to open and beg pardon.
'Well, what say you to this, John?" asked Mrs. Hellwig in cutting tones. "I gave her that veil only a few hours ago, and you can see from her face that it is already lost.  I would like to know how much such extravagance has cost your sainted father, in the course of a year. Give her up, I tell you! Your labor will be all lost upon such as she. You will never be able to extirpate vicious propensities, inherited from a frivolous, immoral mother!"
At this moment a frightful alteration took place in Felicia's exterior. Her face turned crimson, as did also her fair neck up to the point where it was concealed beneath a dress of coarse black stuff. Her dark eyes, which were still moistened with tears of penitence, now flashed defiance in the very face of Mrs. Hellwig. That fearful timidity in presence of this woman, which had lain like a burden on her little heart for five long years, and which had continually kept her lips locked, was all upon a sudden gone. All the misery that had come upon her since yesterday, and tried her nerves to their utmost tension, suddenly pressed upon her overpoweringly, and took from her the last remnants of self-control—she was beside herself.
"Say nothing about my poor dear mother. I will not suffer it!" she cried, her voice, that was usually so soft actually sounding shrill. "She never did you any harm! Uncle always said that we should never speak evil of the dead, who cannot defend themselves—but you do it, and it is bad, all bad."
"Just look at the little fury, John," cried Mrs. Hellwig, scornfully. "That is the result of your father's liberal education! That is 'the fairy-like little creature,' as he called the girl in that letter there!"
"She is right when she defends her mother," said John in an under-tone, and with a grave look; "but the way in which she does it is unmannerly and abominable. How dare you speak so improperly to this lady?'' said he, turning to Felicia, while a faint flush suffused his pale face. "Know you not that you must starve to death if she gives you no bread, and that you would have to sleep in the streets if she drove you out of the house?"
"I do not want her bread!" burst from the child. " She is a bad, bad woman—she has such dreadful eyes—I do not want to stay in her house, where they do not speak truth,  and where the fear of bad treatment is before one all the day long—I would rather go straight under the ground to my dead mother; I would rather die of starvation—"
She could say no more, for John had seized her by the arm, and his thin, bony fingers clamped her flesh as in a vise. He shook her violently several times.
"Come to yourself, come to your senses, abominable child!" cried he. "Fy! a girl and so untamed! Such a temper in addition to that unpardonable bent to levity and frivolity! I see how it is—a great deal has been overlooked here;" at the same time turning to his mother, he added: "but under your discipline, mother, all this will be changed." He did not let go the little girl's arm, and roughly led her out of the room across to the servants' hall.
"From this day forward you are under my authority— note that!" said he roughly; "and although I may be far away, I shall know how to have you summarily punished, just so soon as I hear of you disobeying my mother in the least particular. For your present misconduct you are to be confined to the house for a long while; so much the more as you make such an ill use of freedom. You are not to enter the garden again without special permission from my mother; no more shall you go on the street, save as you go to and fro to the common school, which you are henceforth to frequent; and you must take your meals and spend the rest of the day here in the servants' room, until you have learned better behavior. Have you understood me?" The little girl silently turned away her face, and he left the room.
CHAPTER VIII.
ON the afternoon of the same day the Hellwig family were drinking their coffee out in the garden.    Fredericka had thrown over her shoulders her Sunday shawl, which was of cotton lined with flannel, put on her black, silk-wadded dress-cap, and gone, first to church, and then to pay a visit to a cousin.    Henry and Felicia were alone in the big house, which was silent as a grave-yard.    The former had hours ago returned from a secretly made expedition to the church-yard, bringing home with him the ill-fated veil, which now lay neatly folded up in a chest.
The honest fellow had witnessed the scene of the forenoon from the kitchen and been strongly tempted to leap forward and give the heir of the house just as violent a shaking with his hard fists as he had himself administered to a delicate, if rebellious child.
Now he sat in the servants' hall, whittling at his walking-stick, and at the same time whistling softly, and, if truth must be told, most unmusically. He was evidently ill at ease, for, ever and anon, he glanced restlessly and furtively across at the silent child. Surely that was not little Felicia's face!   There she sat like a caged bird, but one pining still for freedom, and cherishing fierce hatred against the hand that had imprisoned it.    In her lap lay "Robinson Crusoe," which, at his own risk, Henry had abstracted from Nathanael's book-shelf; but she did not bestow upon it a single glance.    That castaway had been well off on his island, where there were no bad people to abuse and slander his dead mother; there the sparkling sunshine rested upon the tops of the palm-trees and the green waves of rich meadow-grass; but here the very light of day was not admitted freely, but must needs be dimmed through the intervention of closely barred windows, and nowhere, neither on the narrow street outside, nor here in the house, was the eye refreshed by the sight of a single green leaf.    To be sure an asclepias-bush did stand in the sitting-room window, the only plant nursed by Mrs. Hellwig, but Felicia could not bear it, with its bunches of flowers fashioned as regularly as if made out of cold porcelain, and its stiff, prim foliage, that was never agitated, let the breeze blow ever so hard.    Ah!  how different it was out in the free, open air, where trees and bushes seemed all alive, and to respond with incessant murmuring and rustling to the slightest touch of the whispering breeze.
Suddenly the little girl jumped up. Upon the top floor, one could get an extensive view of the country round about —it was bright and sunny up there. Like a shadow she glided up the winding stone staircase, that gave access to the upper stories.
As some persons would think, the old merchant's house had become degraded. Long years ago it had been a nobleman's seat. There was still something ambitious in its physiognomy—although not in the same degree as those towers that leave everything beneath them, and evidently aspire to cleave the sky above, and claim it for their own; but this struggling upward showed itself here and there in the towering form of its balcony, and above all in its huge nag-stones, that were deemed so indispensable in those days when game was roasted whole on the spit in a nobleman's kitchen. The blue blood once wont to course so rapidly through the veins of its early knightly inmates, had long since ceased to flow; yes, in these latter days it had gone with it, as with the old house—it had been degraded.
The front part of the house that faced the Market Square had gradually been somewhat modernized, but the back buildings, on the contrary (three immense wings), still stood precisely as they had issued from the hand of their constructor.    There were those long echoing passages, with arched ceilings and floors worn away by much use, pervaded by a dream-like obscurity, even when the sun is shining in its mid-day splendor, and which make it so easy for a traditional ancestress to haunt her old home, in shadowy train, with ghastly countenance, and spectral hands crossed upon her bosom.     Here were still those unexpected back stairways, creaking under the lightest foot-fall, that suddenly loomed up at the end of a corridor, leading down to some mysterious door with triple bolts and bars—those remote, apparently aimless recesses with a solitary window through whose round, lead-incased panes of glass pale columns of light fall upon crumbling brick pavements. The dust, that here and there fell upon the head of the passer-by, was historic; as youthful ligneous filament it had once pertained to some balcony, or as new mortar done service to the blue-blooded knights of yore.
Wherever it had been possible the mason had introduced the armorial bearings of the builder of the house, a Knight von Hirschsprung. The stone casements to door and window, yes even single broad stones in the paved floors, showed the majestic stag, as, lifting high his fore-legs, lie prepared for a terrific leap across the chasm. On the doorposts of one of the grand company rooms in the front building were also to be found the likenesses of the original owner and his spouse, long, lank figures, topped off by queer head-dresses of antique and peaked fashion. With imperishably consequential pride, the honorable knight looked out upon that world, whence his dust and his "eternal" claims to respect had long since been swept away.
Felicia stood at the top of the staircase, and with wide-open wondering eyes looked into a half-open door, that she had never before seen unlocked. How absorbing must have been her act of revenge, to induce so extremely careful a housewife actually to forget to lock up as usual! Behind the door lay an apparently endless corridor, that traversed one of the back buildings, and into which different doors opened. One of these stood open, affording a glimpse of a trash-room, lighted by a mansard window very high up. It was crammed with old rubbish, and sidewise, leaning against a rococo arm-chair, also stood the picture of the j great merchant's proud wife.     It was not even turned against a protecting wall; dust and cob webs might now take undisturbed possession of an image whose prototype had sat to the painter, in the proud conviction that her portrait would be an object of veneration for child and grand-children to remotest times.
The large, prominent, and somewhat lustful eyes, seen from so near a point, had something about them that aroused fear in the child. She turned off in distress, but at! the same moment her little heart experienced a thrill that sent the blood rushing to her head—little Felicia was perfectly well acquainted with that leather-covered trunk on the floor there! Shyly, with bated breath, she pushed back the lid. Onto it lay a little light blue mousseline, whose hem and sash were prettily embroidered. Ah, yes, Fredericka had taken it off her one evening, and then it had vanished, and in place of it Felicia had been compelled to wear a horridly ugly dark gown.
The little hands dived into it deeper and with ever-increasing excitement. Oh! the many familiar things that came to view, and how the soul of the child was wrought up by their reappearance! Her dead mother had had all these articles in her hands, some of them as elegant as though they had decked the person of a born princess. With painful keenness Felicia remembered the sweet feelings she used to have when her mother had dressed her and touched her with her soft, velvety fingers. Ah! here, too, turned up the bright little pin-cushion which had once been the special pride of the child! It was stuck upon a little stand— Stop! there was something sticking in it; but it was no toy, as the child had supposed at first; it was a pretty little agate brooch, on the silver plate of which leaped the same majestic stag shown to excess upon the masonry of the Hellwig mansion. Under the coat-of-arms was inscribed, in fine, faint lines, "M. v. H." This had certainly belonged to mamma, and a pair of covetous little hands had once been stretched out after it.
Higher and higher swelled the tide of memories, and upon many points fell a ray of ripened understanding. Now she comprehended the significance of those moments, when, startled out of a first nap, she had seen standing by her bedside her father in a jacket glittering with gold, and her mother with her fair hair floating loosely about her shoulders —ah! yes, and she could distinguish now the evenings when, her poor mamma had been shot at—oh! how heedlessly her child had looked into that deadly pale face—but she could now distinctly remember that on such evenings she had been always passionately strained to her mother's heart, as though she were in breathless haste. One by one these newly found treasures were stroked and caressed and then carefully laid back in the trunk, and when the lid once more closed down over all, the child flung her arms around the little much-worn chest and lay her head upon it—they were old comrades, these two, who belonged to each other in the wide, wide world which had not the smallest bit of ground to bestow upon an actor's child, not even so much as could be covered by her own little foot. The little face, just now so defiant in its expression, looked mild and conciliatory now, as the little girl lay there, with her tender cheek pressed against the moth-eaten cover of the trunk.
Through the window, soft breezes blew in and out, wafting a stream of balsamic perfume into this retired and quiet spot. How could this intoxicating aroma—that surely must proceed from a whole bed of mignonette—mount up so high in the air? And what— Felicia pushed a rickety table under the window and mounted upon it. Ah, what was that? Nothing indeed of the dreamed-of outlook into the wide world met her gaze; only four walls forming an inclosed square, of which the one lying opposite overtopped the others and precluded any view into the distance; but this very roof in front of her furnished the child's wide-open astonished eyes matter of surprise, such as could not have been surpassed, in the most wonderful of fairy-tales. There, on the high, yet gently inclined slope, were no tiles at all such as the other roofs showed—brownish black, dingy, and covered with moss—no, it was fairly covered with flowers, with asters and dahlias, which rocked their gay heads in the breezes up there with the same security as down below, close to the lap of strong Mother Earth. As far out as a cherishing human arm could reach on the hanging' gallery, skirting the lower edge of the roof, ascended rows of flowers, but there they were met by a mass of foliage in every shade of green, reminding one of a mantle thrown around the shoulders of some brilliant beauty—the wild grape-vine had clambered up to the very top, its tendrils having crept even onto the neighboring roofs, with their shining, indented leaves, and dark purple clusters of fruit.    The gallery ran along the whole length of the roof, and hung there as airily and lightly as though it had been blown there, and yet the part projecting beyond its railing bore heavy boxes full of earth, whence peeped forth a profusion of mignonette, and hundreds of monthly roses, too, there nodded their smiling heads.
A rather unwieldy garden-chair beside a little round table, on which stood a china tea-service, showed, indisputably that creatures of flesh and blood tabernacled here; and yet the child could not quite give up the idea by which she had been at first possessed, viz., that the little room which was shut off from the gallery by a glass door must be the abode of the fairy of the flowers.    Neither roof nor walls were to be seen, both being overgrown by the large-leaved Scotch ivy; the capuchin's cress had worked its way upward until it scattered over the green cupola its spurred calyx with their fiery orange-colored velvety leaves, and hung them playfully over the glass door.    This door gaped a little, and through it issued the sounds which had allured the child to the window.
One look down into the space which the four walls inclosed caused a suspicion to dawn upon little Felicia's mind. A tremendous crowing and cackling were going on down there; so, that was the poultry-yard.    Felicia had never yet seen it, for, through fear that some of the cackling tribe might penetrate into the front yard or entrance-hall mayhap, Fredericka always kept the gate-key in her pocket. But how often had she come into the kitchen with darkened countenance, complaining to Henry that "the old woman was watering her weeds up there, so that the gutters were overflowing'"   Ah! those weeds then were the thousands oil sweet flowers up there, and the person that watered and tended them was—the Old Ma'm'selle, who also at this very minute was once more desecrating the Sabbath afternoon by playing ungodly melodies.
These thoughts had hardly shaped themselves in the little one's brain ere her tiny feet rested upon the ledge of the window.    All the elasticity of a childish soul, that asserts itself in causing suffering and sorrow to be utterly forgotten for the moment in presence of some novelty, came into play on this occasion.
The child could climb like a squirrel, and to run over the roofs was a mere trifle.    At all events there was fine walking over the two gutters hanging to the roofs; to be sure they did look moss-covered and unsteady, and there in the corner where they were joined, two hung aslant, but, never-less, they had not broken for a long, long while, and re not to be compared with the slender rope, upon which Felicia had seen much smaller children than herself dance a time.    She slipped out of the window, and after a few steps across the shelving roof, stood in the gutters.    It groaned and creaked reluctantly beneath the little feet that tripped valiantly forward.    On her right there was not the least support, and on her left a yawning abyss four stories deep; what if motherly eyes could have beheld her! but it turned out splendidly. Another effort, and she had climbed up the considerably higher roof, then, with one bound she had overstepped the railing, and now stood with glowing cheeks and beaming eyes, in the midst of the flowers, and looked, over the other buildings, out into the wide, wide world, which was now irradiated by the crimson glow of an autumn sunset.
On the little round table, too, lay various newspapers, and upon one of these, in passing by, the child read smilingly the title of "Die Gartenlauber." How well this name fitted this place, where it was so bright and sunny, and where the air was so pure and fresh!
And now the little maid stood there and looked timidly through the glass door, which had probably never before reflected the image of a child.    Could it be that the ivy had worked its way through the roof, and continued to grow inside the large chamber?    One could see nothing of the wall's surface, for it was completely covered with a network of living green; but at little intervals, pedestals stood forth from the walls supporting plaster busts of heroic size. And a remarkable collection it was of grave, motionless heads, whose spirituality was enhanced, through the relief into which they were thrown by their background of dark and glistening green.    It happened pleasantly, that here a branch of the allotira had thrown itself straight across the breast of one, and there flung itself as a wreath around the thoughtful brow of another.    The wanton things treated the windows no better; like an obscuring cloud they hung over the curtains, and still those two windows were gorgeous landscape pictures, embracing within their frames, the roofs of many houses below them, the bright autumnal forests on the mountain heights beyond, and pale strips of stubble land interspersed between.
Under the windows stood a piano.    The Old Ma'm'selle sat before it, dressed exactly as she had been the day before and her small hands grappled with the instrument in a manner that was amazing.    Her face looked somewhat different, for she wore spectacles, and the cheeks that had been then so pale, today were flushed.    Little Felicia had entered softly, and stood within the bow of the screen. The old lady either felt the approach of a human being or had heard some sound—for she broke off suddenly in the midst of a brilliant passage, and her large eyes were forthwith directed toward the child from above her spectacles.    The fragile frame of the recluse seemed to have been thrilled by an electric shock, and a slight scream escaped her lips; with her trembling right hand she took off her spectacles and got up, as she did so supporting herself by means of the instrument.
"How come you here, my child?''' asked she, at last, with unsteady voice, that was, however, soft and mild despite her affright.
"Over the roofs," timidly answered the little maid, now become anxious in her turn, and pointing back to the yard.
"Over the roofs? That is impossible. Come here and show me how you came." She took the child by the hand and led her out upon the gallery. Felicia pointed to the mansard window, and to the gutter. The old lady clapped her hands before her face in horror.
"Ah! do not be alarmed," said Felicia, with her sweet, innocent voice. "It really was not hard. I can climb like a boy, and Doctor Bohm is always saying that I must have wings, since I fly rather than walk."
The Old Ma'm'selle let her hands fall from before her face and smiled—nor did this smile lack grace, inasmuch as it displayed two rows of very beautiful white teeth. She led the little girl back into the room, and seated herself in an arm-chair.
"You are little Fay, I suppose, then?" said she, drawing Felicia to her side. "I know it, although you have not come to me flying upon rose-colored gauze wings. Your old friend Henry was telling me about you just a little while ago."
At the mention of Henry's name the whole weight of her sorrow rolled again upon the child. As in the morning, a glowing flush suffused her cheeks, while indignation and grief drew around her little mouth those harsh lines that in the course of one night had entirely metamorphosed the expression of the child's countenance. This sudden alteration did not escape the eyes of the Old Ma'm'selle. She affectionately took the little girl's face between her hands, and stooped down over her.
" Look here, my little daughter," she continued, " for many years past Henry has been coming up to see me every Sunday, in order to attend to many a thing for me.    He knows that he may never repeat to me news from the front part of the house, and hitherto he has never transgressed this command.    How much he must love little Fay, to induce him suddenly to go counter to a desire of mine, so emphatically expressed!" The child's defiant eyes melted. "Yes, he loves me—but nobody else does," said she, her voice giving way.
"Nobody else?" repeated the old lady, while her inexpressibly tender glance rested upon the countenance of the little one with loving earnestness.   "Do you not know that there is One who will always love you, although all men should turn away from you? The dear Lord will—" "Oh, He will have nothing to do with me, because I am an actor's child!" said Felicia, interrupting the speaker with an outburst of passion.    "Mrs.  Hellwig said, this morning, that my soul was as good as lost, and all of them down in the front part of the house there say that He cast out my poor mamma, and that she is not with Him.    So I do not love Him either any more—no, not one bit.    And I do not want to go to Him when I die—what should I do there, where my mamma is not?"
The old lady arose hurriedly, and opened a side door. It seemed to the child as though a little cloud from the sky fluttered in and hovered about her head. Over a bed standing in one corner, over doors and windows, hung white muslin curtains. Only narrow strips of the pale green wall were visible, here and there, between its fleecy folds. There was as great a contrast between this little room pure, spotless and fresh as the thoughts that issue from an upright mind, and that dreary-looking boudoir down in the front part of the house, where Mrs. Hellwig, in the early morning hours, knelt upon her hassock—upon that hassock whose embroidered cushion had space for the cruel implements of the torture, but none whatever for a symbol of peace and reconciliation.
On the candle-stand by the bedside, lay a large, much-used Bible. The old lady opened it with a steady, practical hand, and read aloud with deep feeling: "If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love become sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal." And she read on and on until she closed with the verse, "Love never faileth; but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall be done away." "And this love comes from Him, yes, God Himself is love," said she, laying her arm around the child's shoulders. "Your mamma is His child, as are all of us, and she has gone home to Him, for 'love never faileth.' Think of her confidently as safely housed above, and at night when you look up at the sky with its millions of wonderful stars, think of her as shining in a radiant home beyond, waiting to welcome you, her darling, to the same bright joys that the dear Saviour has prepared for all who love Him from the heart. And now, when you think of this, you will love Him again, love Him right heartily, will you not, my little Fay?"
The child made no answer, but flung both arms passionately about her mild comforter, and a stream of hot tears gushed from her eyes.
Two days later a carriage stopped before the Hellwig mansion. The widow got into it, with her two sons, in order to accompany them as far as the next town. John was going to Bonn to study medicine, but he was, beforehand, to drop Nathanael at the same institute where he had himself been educated.
Henry stood comfortably squared off in the open front door, with Fredericka at his side, both looking after the carriage as it slowly and clumsily jolted over the roughly paved Market Square. Something akin to a low whistle escaped his puckered lips—with him this was always a sign of being in a pleasant mood—and both thumbs buried themselves deeply in the powerful fists, in a manner that the country people interpret as saying: "God preserve us from a return of the evil!''
"At any rate five or six years must elapse ere we have one or the other lording it over us here in the house," said he, in a tone of self-gratulation, to Fredericka, who, as in duty bound, wiped her eyes with the end of her apron.
"And a proper speech, indeed, for you to make, you dunderhead!    Pretty thanks you give for the money just given you by the young master!"
"Go to your kitchen, jade—on the hearth you will find the thing; I'll not touch it with one of my fingers! You may buy yourself with it, for my sake, a red frock and a pair of yellow shoes to go to the next fair in." 
"Oh, you godless creature!    A red frock and yellow shoes, indeed, just as if I were a rope-dancer!" cried the cook as if insulted.   "Never mind, I know well enough what makes you so wrathy—the young master gave it to you well this morning, that he did, and no mistake." "Eh, you do not know everything, though!" remarked the man-servant, coolly, and so saying, he stuck his hands in the side-pockets of his coat, and planted himself more squarely than ever on the threshold.   This demeanor roused Federicka's ill-humor to the point of passion, for it expressed the utmost contempt for what she was saying. "The man has twenty dollars for wages, and may be fifty dollars in the savings' bank,'' she exclaimed, venomously, ''and lo he stands before his rich master as if he the Grand Mogul, and says: ' Give me the strange child, and I'll place her with my sister, where she shall not cost you one cent, and—' "
"And then the young master answered," said Henry, completing her sentence for her, while he slowly turned his face toward the infuriated woman: "'The child is in the best of hands, Henry; in any event she is to stay in this house until she has attained her eighteenth year, and you are not to dare to support her in ever resisting my mother's authority—and if you should ever catch that old hag in the kitchen eavesdropping again, just nail her fast to the doorposts by the ears.'    What would you think of it then, Fredericka, if I should now"—he raised his arm, and the old cook fled, outraged, into the kitchen.
CHAPTEE IX.
NINE years had passed over the stately house on the Market Square; but neither upon its solid walls nor upon the womanly profile at the well-known window on the ground floor, had they been able to affix the impress of decay. May be the dragon-heads high up on the roof did look a little used-up to the eyes of an attentive observer— and no wonder, either, for although dragon-heads, they wept with the sky, year in and year out, pouring forth streams of tears upon the flag-stones below, and when afterward the sun came out and penetrated them with its heat— it was too much for them—such sudden changes were enough to alter any physiognomy. But the woman down there held her ground, upon the score of her own infallibility—in this unchangeably frigid region there are no doubts, no struggles, no inward wrestlings whence conies that outward fossilization, which commonly goes by the name of good preservation.
However, the old house did show one striking alteration. The blinds in the large chamber opening on the balcony had been perpetually rolled up for some weeks past, and flower-pots stood on the window-seats. As in duty bound, the eyes of the passers-by first sought the window with the asclepias plant in it, and Mrs. Hellwig might always reckon upon being reverentially greeted; but then they would glance furtively up at the balcony. There in the middle of the stone window casements frequently appeared a charming woman's face, really dazzling in its freshness, a head covered with light brown curls, with dove-like blue eyes that looked almost child-like in their simplicity, and this head sat upon a blooming body of fairest proportions, that was generally incased in soft white muslin. Sometimes, not often, however, the lovely picture in the window-frame had a disfiguring accession—a childish form, upon such occasions, had climbed upon a chair and looked curiously over the shoulders of the lady down upon the Market Square; an ugly little face it was that thus peered out, frightfully disfigured by the ravages of scrofula, the hand which had twisted its thin white locks into pretty ringlets had labored in vain; the ugliness of that pale, bloated countenance was only made to look more grotesque beneath such an elaborate array of curls, and neither was the very elegant dress often arranged so as to conceal the unshapely waist and swollen limbs of the child. But despite the contrast presented by their outward appearance, the two were mother and child, and for the sake of the latter had come to Thuringia.
It happened, that within the course of the last nine years a conjurer had cast his divining rod quite near to the precincts of the town of X-----.    This modern enchanter's wand had allured to the surface a bitter spring, that on exposure to the air hardened, not into silver and gold, but into something more valuable, viz., crystalline salt.    This gave a hint to the people of X—. They established a watering-place that, in conjunction with the reputation of the Thuringian air, soon attracted hither crowds of invalids in search of health, from all parts of the world.
This young widow had also come to the town in order to give her child the benefit of the salt bath, and we may add, by advice of Professor John Hellwig at Bonn. Yes; there I is no denying that the woman down there behind the Asclepias plant had done much for her son.    It had been I through her management that he had been given early into the training hands of her strictly religious cousin on the Rhine.    During his seven years' absence she had not allowed him to come home for the holidays a single time; she had every morning punctually named him in her stated prayers, and was never tired of controlling the number and quality of his shirts from the distance—and so there he was now a famous man.
As for the rest, with all his fame and fine education, the young professor would hardly have succeeded in getting his patient quartered in his mother's.
Mrs. Hellwig sat at the window on the first floor. Any one would have supposed that time had passed over her without leaving a trace behind, to judge from her fine, black worsted dress, her collars and cuffs, up to the little pin that fastened her collar under her chin; her dress was precisely the same as upon the first evening when we were introduced to this proper woman. Only her bust appeared fuller; tight sleeves fitted closely around her strong arms, and the mantua-maker must have slyly introduced a few more gathers than of old into the skirt of her prim and tastelessly cut gown. Her large white hands lay idly in her lap, together with some knitting—just now she had something more important to attend to.
At the door, at a very reverential distance, stood a man; his scrawny figure was concealed by a threadbare coat, and the hand, which he often lifted in speaking, was full of whelks.    He spoke softly and with hesitation—and yet the room was oppressively still, and no sound interrupted him, I save the ticking of the clock upon the wall.    Not one encouraging word proceeded from the stern woman's mouth; nay, it rather seemed as though that motionless figure were not breathing, and as if that steady, immovable gaze were fixed forever.    The man's anxious face was pale, and, wiping the sweat from his brow with his cotton pocket-handkerchief, he finally stopped from exhaustion.
"You have come to the wrong party. Master Thienemann," said Mrs. Hellwig, coldly, after a pause. "l am not going to split my money up into such small sums."
"Oh, Mrs. Hellwig, I did not mean that; I would not make so bold!" replied the man, earnestly, drawing one step nearer. "But you are known as a benevolent lady, ever busied in making collections for the poor, and your name is often seen in the newspapers, in connection with lotteries and the like, and I only meant to beg of you to advance me, from the sums you have collected, the small amount of twenty-five dollars."
Mrs. Hellwig smiled; the man did not know that he was now sounding the death-knell of his hopes.
"I could almost fancy that you were a little beside yourself, Master Thienemann—this proposition is something entirely novel!" said she, cuttingly. "However, I well know that you are not at all concerned in the efforts of the faithful in behalf of our holy church; and so, I just tell you, that, of the three hundred dollars that are in my hands at present for distribution, not one dime stays here in this town. I have collected it for the mission cause; it is sacred money, destined to glorify a God of mercy, but not to support people that can work."
"Mrs. Hellwig, I am not wanting in industry!" exclaimed the man, in a half-stifled voice. "But sickness has brought us to want. Oh, Lord! thou knowest that in better days I used to work at pretty little things of a holiday evening to give to your fairs, because I thought they were for the benefit of our poor, and now the money is all lent far away, while there are many left at home who have not a shoe for their feet, and in winter not a stick of wood for their fire!"
"I forbid any accusations made to my face! For that matter we do good here, too, Master Thienemann, but with discrimination. Men who attach themselves to those trades' unions, with their false teachings, as a matter of course get nothing. You would do much better to stick to your carpenter's bench than to be gawking at the stars and stones, and maintaining that many things are different from the way that they are stated in Holy Writ. Yes, yes, blasphemous speeches of the sort come to our ears, and we note the authors diligently as desperate cases. You know my views now and have nothing to hope for from me." Mrs. Hellwig turned off and looked out of the window. "Good heavens! What must a man submit to when he is poor!" sighed the poor fellow. "I have to thank my wife for this; she would not rest until I came to this house."
He gave one more look toward the second window of the chamber, and getting from there neither help nor one consoling word, he went out of the door. The poor workman's last glance had been directed toward the pretty little widow, who sat opposite to Mrs. Hellwig. Were female presence ever fitted to inspire hope in the breast of the needy, it was the case with that blooming creature in dress of airy, spotless white muslin. The soft lines of her profile, the glorifying radiance of the bright curls upon her forehead, and the blue eyes, all together produced the impression of an angelic countenance. There was something found lacking, however, in the eyes of an attentive observer; for, while more than once during the foregoing scene Mrs. Hellwig's brow had been flushed from excitement, as the petitioner had laid off his troubles with such touching accompaniments of voice and gesture, not for one instant had the expression of smiling tranquillity left that lovely oval. Her fair bosom rose and fell most tranquilly; the half-finished rose that she was embroidering had increased by one leaf while this little scene was progressing, and the sharpest eye could not have detected the least mistake in her carefully counted cross-stitches. "You have not let that man worry you, have you, auntie?" asked she in sweet, affectionate tones, looking up from her embroidery, after the tradesman had left the room. "My poor, dear husband, too, used to be bitterly opposed to those progressionists, and he had a horror of that union concern— Only behold, there is Caroline!"
As she made this exclamation she nodded toward the door leading from the kitchen. A young girl had come in there quite a long while ago, even while the tradesman was present, and was standing there quietly. He who had seen the beautiful young wife of the conjurer standing to receive the running fire of the soldiers' weapons, would have been startled at thus seeing her again apparently resurrected. Here was her very figure, although more delicate and maidenly, while the dress, in this instance, was of coarse, dark stuff, instead of being set off by the glittering array of theatrical splendor. Here was the same faultlessly shaped head, with smooth white brow and the corners of the mouth curving imperceptibly downward, in a manner that gave the face a touching expression of tender melancholy. In the ill-fated woman of former days that expression had been intensified by the tearful looks of a pair of dark gray eyes, while this young girl, on the contrary, just now lifted her long dark eyelashes and displayed a pair of brilliant brown orbs, that did not give one at all the impression of a subdued spirit. No, there was power and strength of resistance in her glance, for the blood of Poland was flowing also in the veins of this young creature—a stray drop of that noble stream, which rises up again and again, in futile resistance against oppression.
We know now that the young girl standing within the door-way is none other than Felicia, although, perforce, she answers to the simple name of Caroline, since Mrs. Hellwig had no sooner taken the reins into her own hands than that "silly, fancy name" had been cast, "with all the rest of that theatrical rubbish, into her trash-room."
Felicia approached the mistress of the house and laid upon her work-stand a beautifully embroidered cambric pocket-handkerchief. The little widow hastily snatched it up.
"Is that to be sold for the benefit of the missionary-box, aunt?" asked she, while she unfolded the handkerchief and examined the embroidery.
"To be sure it is," answered Mrs. Hellwig. "I have had Caroline do it with this view—and she has been dawdling over it long enough. I think it will be worth three dollars."
"May be so," said the other lady, shrugging her shoulders. "Where did you get that design for the corner, my dear?"
A slight color mounted to Felicia's cheek.
"I sketched it myself," answered she, in a low voice.
The young widow looked up quickly. Her blue eye changed at this moment till it looked almost green.
"That, indeed? sketched it yourself, did you?" repeated she slowly. "Do not take it ill of me, little girl, but that is a piece of presumption which I cannot understand. How can any one attempt anything of the sort without the requisite training? This is genuine linen cambric, and must have cost my aunt at least a dollar—now it is spoiled through that awkward design." Mrs. Hellwig fired up at this.
"Oh, do not be angry with Caroline, dear aunt, for she doubtless means well," pleaded the younger lady's soft voice. "Perhaps it may yet bring something. You see, child, I have myself never learned to draw upon principle; the pencil does not please me in a woman's hand, but nevertheless I have a very, very sharp eye for a faulty drawing. Bless me, what a monstrous leaf we have here!" She pointed to a long narrow leaf, the point of which was bent over, and stood out from the sheer muslin in a manner closely resembling nature. Felicia answered not a word, but her soft lips were closely compressed, and she I met firmly the fault-finder's gaze. The pretty widow turned away impulsively, and drew her right hand over her eyes.
"Ah, child, now you put on one of your piercing looks," complained she. "It really is not comely for a young girl in your circumstances to give others such provoking glances. Remember what our good friend, Secretary Wellner, always says: 'Pretty, humble, dear Caroline.' Look, there again you have a contemptuous expression about your mouth—it is enough to provoke anybody! And now do you actually mean to play the romantic and obstinately reject the offer of this honorable man, because—forsooth, you do not love him?    Absurd.     However, my Cousin John will know how to put his veto upon such nonsense!"
How practiced must that young girl have been in self-control! At these last words of the young widow she started, and the hot blood was seen to rush tumultuously to her head. She drew herself up suddenly to her full height, and a truly menacing expression of hatred and contempt passed over her features. And yet, immediately afterward, she said quietly and coldly: "I'll take the risk of that."
"How often shall I have to beg of you, Adele, not to touch upon that disputed matter?" said Mrs. Hellwig crossly. "Do you imagine, for a moment, that in a few weeks you could break the will of an obstinate, hard-headed thing, with whom I have contended in vain these nine years? Just as soon as John comes, the affair will be settled, and I'll set my mark. Now go and fetch my hat and mantilla," said she, haughtily, to Felicia. "I do hope that this bungled piece of work is the last thing you will have a chance to spoil while in my service," and she threw the handkerchief contemptuously aside.
Felicia silently left the room. Soon afterward Mrs. Hell-wig and her guest crossed over the Market Square. The pretty woman led her child by the hand with motherly tenderness. Many heads were stuck out of the windows in their eagerness to follow with their eyes a charming creature who had a sweet innocent smile for all. Rosa, her maidservant, and Fredericka followed, with baskets on their arms. Their supper was to be eaten in the garden, where they were to spend some time in weaving wreaths and garlands. On the next morning the young professor was expected at home, after an absence of nine years; and although Mrs. Hellwig grumbled over such "fooleries," the younger widow would not be denied the pleasure of decorating the chamber of him whom she would welcome to the home of his childhood.
CHAPTER X.
THE HOME-COMING OF AN HEIR.
HENBY closed the house-door, and Felicia went upstairs. That narrow passage, with its damp, pent-up air, branching off to the side at the top, how pleasant its associations to the young girl now gliding through it with eager steps! Then came a quiet, remote vestibule, dimly lighted from above by panes of bottle-green glass, that threw a pale luster upon an awkward, worm-eaten staircase, coming up out of gloomy twilight at the lower end, and also upon an ancient door covered over with stiffly painted tulips and brick-red roses. Felicia drew a key from her pocket and noiselessly opened the door, behind which a narrow, dark staircase led up to the mansard.
The young girl had not had to cross the break-neck path over the roofs more than a single time.    From the time of her first visit access to the Old Ma'm'selle's secluded retreat had never been forbidden her.    During the first years her visits had been limited to Sunday, and she had then gone up under Henry's escort.    After her confirmation, however, the Old Ma'm'selle had transmitted to her the key to the painted chamber, and since then she had profited by every free moment to slip up there unseen. She consequently led a twofold life.    It was not only externally that she touched the low and high, dividing her time between melancholy darkness and clear sunlight. Her soul profited by this exchange, and gradually became so strengthened that all shadows and gloom were left behind her in the lower region, just so soon as she set foot upon the narrow, dark stairway that led up on high.    Down-stairs she had to do with flat-irons and kitchen spoons; her so-called time of leisure, even, must be filled up with embroidery, the proceeds of which were destined, as we have already seen, for benevolent aims; and with the exception of the Bible and Prayer-book, all reading was strictly prohibited to her.    In the mansard, on the contrary, the marvels of the human intellect were revealed to her.    She learned with real avidity, and the knowledge of the mysterious recluse up there was like an inexhaustible fountain, or like a polished diamond that emits its rays, turn it in whatever direction you will.
With the exception of Henry, no one in the house knew of this intercourse, for the slightest suspicion of it on the part of Mrs. Hellwig would have put a summary close to it as a matter of course.    In spite of this, the Old Ma'm'selle had constantly impressed it upon the child to speak the exact truth, if she were ever questioned on the subject.   Fortunately, however,  it never came to this.    Henry was faithful watchman, and stood upon guard, having eyes and ears both open.
The dark stairs had been surmounted.    Felicia paused to listen before a door, then pushed aside a bolt that protected it, and looked in smilingly.    It went like mad in there. Such a strange commingling as there was, of singing, chirping, and screeching.    In the middle of the place rose up two fir-trees; along the walls ran evergreen shrubs, than which no garden could display fresher ones, and in their branches dwelt a merry company of birds.    Such was the society that the Old Ma'm'selle had brought up here, to cheer her solitude.    True, their little throats sent forth always the same melodies, but, as a compensation, they had nothing to do with the unhallowed variableness of human tongues, that today shout "Hosanna," and tomorrow "Crucify him!"
Felicia replaced the bar, and opened a second door. Years ago the reader was admitted to a glimpse at this ivy-wreathed apartment, he is acquainted with that collection of grave heads, that are ranged around its walls, but he does not know that they stand in close connection with those great books, bound in red morocco, which lie there piled up in an old-fashioned glass press.    A mighty flood it is that has issued from those brains—and he who knows how to unchain it, no longer is conscious of loneliness or desertion. It was the great musicians of various ages, who in image and in their works shared the asylum of the Old Ma'm'-selle, and as the ivy boughs entwined themselves impartially around the busts of all, so the lonely piano-player was wont to draw her inspiration equally from the old Italian and German masters of music.    But the glass press concealed other treasures also, that would have excited the cupidity of an autograph collector, and thrown him into an ecstasy.    Here were the manuscripts and handwriting of those mighty men, most of the specimens being rare and of great value, preserved in portfolios, that were seen through the glass doors of the book-case.    This collection had been made in earlier years, when, as the Old Ma'm'selle averred, her blood yet coursed quickly through her veins, and her wishes were backed by energy.    Many a sheet of paper, now yellow with age, had been obtained by considerable self-sacriflce and the expenditure of uncommon perseverance.
Felicia found the Old Ma'm'selle in a closet behind her sleeping-room. She sat upon a low footstool before an open wardrobe, and around her, upon chairs and floor, lay rolls of white linen, flannel, and a multitude of other small articles, such as the child of man needs immediately after he has given his first cry. The old lady turned her head toward the new-comer. Her fine features had noticeably altered, and although just now they expressed lively joy, the marks of decay could not be thereby obliterated.
"It is well that you have come, my dear Fay!" cried she, to the young girl.    " At Joiner Thienemann's an interesting event is expected every minute, as the nurse has just told me, and the people have not a single rag of clothing ready for the poor little babe. We have a right respectable show of material for preparing a nice bundle, only this thing is lacking''—so saying, she put a tiny rose-colored cap on her small fist, holding up to it a bit of white lace— " you could fix this in a little time. Fay," continued she; "for these things must be ready to go this evening, at the latest.''
"Ah! Aunt Cordelia," said Felicia, as she took up her needle and thread, "that is not all the help those people need. I know positively that Master Thienemann is in sore need of money, even so much as five-and-twenty silver dollars."
The Old Ma'm'selle pondered.
"Hem; that is a good deal for the present state of my I finances," considered she, "but it will have to go."
She got up with difficulty. Felicia offered her her arm I and led her into the music-room.
"Aunt,"   said   she,   suddenly   standing   still,   "Mrs. Thienemann refused a short time ago to do your washing for fear of offending Mrs. Hellwig—have you thought of that?"
"I verily believe you want to lead your old aunt on to the ice!" cried the Old Ma'm'selle, angrily, at the same time that there was a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. She lightly drew her finger across the young girl's cheek. Both laughed and moved toward the glass press.
This heavy, old-fashioned piece of furniture also had its own secrets. Aunt Cordelia pressed upon a meaningless-looking ornament, and a small door in the outer side-wall sprung open. The space becoming visible was the Old Ma'm'selle's bank, and in earlier times had had for Felicia's childish eyes all the mysterious fascination of a Christmas-box, for only seldom durst she cast a shy, half-satisfied glance at all the precious and rare things here stowed away. Upon the small shelves lay a few rolls of money, pieces of silver and jewelry.
While her aunt opened a roll and thoughtfully counted out the dollars, Felicia took up a box standing in the darkest corner, and opened it with curiosity. There lay in it a gold bracelet, softly imbedded in wadding; no precious stones adorned it, but it felt heavy in the hand, and must have been of massive gold. But what was especially peculiar about it was its size—it would certainly have slipped over a lady's hand, and hence seemed far better suited for the larger wrist of some strong man. Toward the middle it became considerably broader, and here the graver's tool had in a wonderful manner wrought a wreath of roses and foliage into a medallion. The wreath encircled the following lines:
"Swa zwei liep ein ander meinent herzenliclien ane wanc Und sich beidiu so vereinent."
The young girl turned the bracelet in all directions, looking for a continuation; for although no adept in old German, still she readily translated the last line into the words, "And are thus united." But that was no conclusion.
"Aunt, do you know the rest?" asked she, still continuing her search with eagerness.
The Old Ma'm'selle held her finger upon a dollar just laid down, and looked up, in the midst of her counting.
"Oh, child! what is that you have stumbled upon?" cried she, passionately—displeasure, fright, and grief, all mingling in the tones of her voice. She snatched at the bracelet impulsively, with trembling hand laid it in its box, and pressed the lid down upon it.    A faint, red spot suddenly burned upon either cheek, and the knitted eyebrows gave her glance a somewhat sinister expression, such as the young maiden had never before seen to rest there.    Yes, it almost seemed as if the present were suddenly swept away before the mighty rushing in of a tide of old memories, as if the old lady no longer knew that Felicia was at her side; for after she had thrust the box back into its corner, she caught up a case standing near it, with gray paper pasted over it, and caressingly passed her right hand over its worn-out edges; her features became milder, she sighed and murmured something to herself, while she pressed it against her sunken breast.    "It must die before me—and yet I cannot see it die!"
Felicia, in great distress, flung her arms round the little, delicate form, that, at this moment, stood before her relaxed and helpless.    For the first time during the nine years of their intercourse, she now saw her aunt lose the power of self-control.    Tender and drooping in outward appearance, she had yet shown, under all circumstances, a remarkably strong mind, and an unswerving dignity, that allowed no outward pressure to shake it from its equipoise. She had attached herself to Felicia with every fiber of her loving heart, and lavished upon her all the treasures of her life-long acquirements of knowledge and experience.    And yet, even to her, had never been lifted the veil that hid her past.    And now, with incautious precipitancy, Felicia had touched nerves that evidently still quivered painfully.    She reproached herself most bitterly.
"Oh, aunt, forgive me!" she pleaded, imploringly. Ah! with what touching and child-like humility this young girl could beg pardon, whom Mrs. Hellwig had stigmatized as an obstinate, hard-headed thing!
The Old Ma'm'selle drew her hand over her eyes. "Be still, child, you have done no harm; but I—I prate childishly, like a real old woman!" said she, with almost inaudible voice.  "Yes, I am old, old and infirm!   Formerly I used to clinch my teeth, that kept my tongue still, and I stood firm before outsiders; that will do no longer—it is time that I were gone."
She still held the little narrow box lingeringly in her hands, as though she struggled after the courage to carry out the sentence of death which she had just pronounced.
After a few seconds, however, she laid it hurriedly in its former place, and closed the press. And herewith she seemed to resume her outward tranquillity. She stepped up to the round table that stood by the press, and upon which she had counted out the money. As though nothing whatever had happened to disturb her, she took up the roll again and added two more dollars to the pile.
"Let us wrap the money in a nice piece of paper," said she to Felicia—her voice, indeed, betrayed signs of the fierce inward struggle through which she had just passed— " and hide the packet in the little pink cap, so that it may have already been the bearer of a blessing, ere it covers the little head for which it is destined. And Henry is to be at his post this evening at nine o'clock precisely—do not forget that!"
It would seem, then, that the Old Ma'm'selle had her great peculiarities—she was shy of observation, more especially in her works. Like the bats, they began to stir abroad only at nightfall, and knocked at the door of poverty when the streets were empty and the eyes of men weary.
Henry had, for long years, played the part of that right hand, concerning whose deeds the left hand is to know nothing; he distributed   the Old  Ma'm'selle's   charities among  the   dwellings  of the  poor with a  caution  and secrecy that were wonderful on the part of a rough serving-man, from whom such delicacy could never have been expected.    So, it came to pass that many in the town eat the bread of that Old Ma'm'selle of whom they believed, and upon occasion would  have sworn,  the most  abominable things.    Assuredly this was a peculiarity incomprehensible to pietists, who did their good works to be seen of men, and thanked God that they were not as other men were. 1 While the Old Ma'm'selle was carefully folding up the money Felicia opened the glass door that led to the gallery. It was the end of May.    Oh, spring! thou theme of many songs, how few know thee under the guise which thou dost wear in the Thuringian country.    There thou art no fair-haired  wanton Southern  boy, through  whose  veins the blood is bubbling like champagne, and from beneath whose footsteps spring perpetually the orange-blossom and myrtle. High thoughts are imprinted on thy brow, and about thy lips play the placid smile of creative energy.    Cautiously thy colors are blended and thy pictures painted in comfortable composure; we follow the strokes of thy pencil with quiet gladness—they are not bold and strong, but lovely, and full of meditative grace.    The reddish  green down that lies upon' the breast of the wooded mountains, while upon their brows the snow crown still rests untouched, the delicate green spires of sprouting blade and grass on the brown surface of the earth, and upon the dry last year's growth of grass upon the meadows and cliffs—all this thou wilt gradually and gently change into green foliage, snow-drops and patches of violets—and after quiet reflection and consideration thou wilt finally fetch forth thy thousandfold treasures of brilliant coloring like a provident gardener from the protected garden, and tint with them forest and field and hedge.    And the breath of thy mouth is that spicy air that steels the nerves and senses of the Thuringian native, rendering his heart sensitive to song, and holding it firm in its adhesion to poetical superstitions, that  sustains him in his sense of right, his tendency to oppose, his naive trustfulness and—his charming rusticity.
Away over yonder, long narrow wheat-fields, like broad bands of green ribbon, skirted the forest, and ran into the valley.    The earliest   cherry-trees, as well as the wild knotted pear-trees, stood dressed in white upon their confines, the child of nature decked out as gloriously as the tenderest pet of the most carefully kept conservatory—an impartiality of nature, this, that man sighs after, but in vain.   Upon the outer edge of the gallery bloomed hyacinths, lilies of the valley and tulips, and on both sides of the glass door stood immense bushes of syringa and snowballs, in tubs of earth.
Felicia moved the little round table in front of the screen, and drew up to it the Old Ma'm'selle's comfortable armchair.    She laid upon it a fresh napkin, and arranged her little coffee-urn; the work to be finished for the baby was also laid out upon it, and when presently a sweet odor of fragrant Mocha streamed out upon the gallery from the singing and hissing little coffee-pot, the Old Ma'm'selle was    sitting  there  comfortably in her arm-chair gazing out I dreamily into the sunlit world of spring. Felicia had taken up her work again. "Aunt," said she, after a little pause, emphasizing each one of her words, "he is coming tomorrow."
"Yes, my dear, I know it through the newspapers. The news comes from Bonn ‘that Professor Hellwig is going for recreation to spend two months in Thuringia.’ He has become a famous man, Fay!"
"His fame must have come easily to him. He knows nothing of that pain which comes from the collision of duty with compassion. He cuts into the flesh and souls of his fellow-creatures with equal delight."
The Old Ma’m’selle fastened her astonished gaze upon Felicia’s countenance; this tone, full as it was of unspeakable bitterness, was new to  her.
"Take heed lest you be unjust, m child," said she after a momentary silence, slowly and with indescribable mildness. Felicia looked up quickly—her brown eyes, at this moment, looked almost black.
"I should hardly know how to set about thinking more kindly of him," replied she; "he has sinned against me grievously, and I know that I could not be sorry if misfortune overtook him, and moreover, that if I could help him to good fortune I would not lift my finger in his behalf—"
"Fay—"
"Yes, aunt, this is the truth.    I have always brought a smooth countenance up here to you, because I did not want; to spoil for you and myself the few brief hours that we were permitted to pass together.    You have often believed me happy and content when there was a real tempest, raging within my breast.    Only put yourself in my place, and fancy how you would feel to hear your parents calumniated as persons hated of God, and deserving to be blamed for every fault with which you yourself were charged—to feel within that struggling after something higher, and then be thrust back scornfully among the ignorant, because you were poor, and hence had no right to high cultivation —to see these, your tormentors, surrounded by the halo of piety, while with impunity they dare to annihilate you intellectually in the name of the Lord.    And suppose that you did bear all this quietly, without every drop of blood in your veins boiling, if you could pardon, it would not be the forbearance of an angel, but the cowardly, slavish subjection of a feeble soul that deserved to be trodden underfoot!"
Felicia spoke firmly, with deep, sonorous voice.    What extraordinary control had this young creature over her external bearing!—hardly so much as a hand was raised, bile these passionate words poured forth from her lips. ''The thought that I am again to meet that stormy gaze excites me more than I can tell you, aunt," continued she, after drawing a deep breath.   ''He will again repeat to me with the same unmoved voice all that he broke to me, in writing, nine years ago.    Like the cruel boy, who lets a poor winged creature flutter at the end of a string, so he has bound me to this dreadful house, and thereby converted my uncle's last will into a curse.    Can anything be more cruel than has been his treatment toward me?    I durst have no intellectual capabilities, no tenderness of heart, no high sense of honor—all this was out of place in an actor's child; her disgraceful origin could only be expiated by her becoming the so-called maid of her master, one of those poor creatures whose vision is as circumscribed as possible." "Well, my dear, we have overcome all that!" said Aunt Cordelia, with a meaning smile.    "As for the rest, we must expect a crisis in your destiny to occur upon his arrival," added she, gravely.
"Assuredly after many a conflict! Mrs. Hellwig comforted me this evening with the hint that then all would come to an end between us."
"Well, and then I need not repeat to you any more that you must stay your time out down there in order to fulfill the last wishes of him who took you into his house, and loved you as his own child. Then you will be perfectly free, and can become your old aunt's companion before the eyes of the whole world, and we need no longer dread being parted, inasmuch as down there they have resigned their right in you."
Felicia looked up with beaming eyes, and impulsively seized the Old Ma'm'selle's little withered hand, and drew it to her lips.
"And think no worse of me, aunt, now that I have let you see into the depths of my inmost soul," implored she in a softened voice. '' I love my fellow creatures and have a high opinion of them, and if I have fought so energetically against intellectual death, I have been partly urged to this through the hope of becoming more, in their midst, than a common beast of burden. Moreover, when ill-used by individuals I have been far from extending my resentment to mankind collectively. I have never imbibed mistrust of humanity. On the other hand, I am not equal to loving my enemies and blessing them who curse me. If this is a blot upon my character, I cannot help it, and, aunt, I would not either, for here lies the dividing line between goodness and want of spirit.
Aunt Cordelia was silent, and fastened her melancholy gaze upon the floor. Had, she, too, experienced a moment in her life, when she either could not forgive, or if so, with self-command untold? She purposely let the conversation drop, herself took needle and thread in hand, and the work went on now uninterruptedly, so that, by the time evening closed in upon them they had ready a bundle of magnificent proportions. Deep were the joy and gratitude felt by the poor master-joiner upon the receipt of "that little capital," for which he had sued in vain from those who esteemed themselves to be "the favored of God," and which he now unconsciously received from the hands of the so-called unbeliever.
When Felicia left the apartments of the Old Ma'm'selle, she found them all agog in the front part of the house. The young widow's child, little Anna, was heard laughing and prattling, and the front hall on the second story once more resounded with the strong strokes of a hammer. The young girl flew through the long corridor that opened upon the vestibule. There stood Henry on the top of a ladder, fastening garlands up over a door. At sight of Felicia he made a comical face, in which spite, mockery, and ill-humor strove for the mastery, and beat a few times more so violently upon the heads of the unhappy nails that it seemed as if he wanted to wreak his vengeance upon them. He then descended from his perch.
With solemn earnestness little Anna had held the ladder, to keep him from falling, but when she caught sight of Felicia, she forgot her important office, tottered awkwardly up to her, and tenderly flung her little arms about her knees. The maiden lifted her from the floor, and took her into her arms.
"Why, these people are carrying on as if we were to have a wedding in the house," muttered Henry, with vexation in his tones, ''while the fact is, somebody is coming who looks neither to the right nor to the left, and the live-long day is making a face as if he had swallowed vinegar."
He picked up one end of the garland.    "Only to behold, there is a little forget-me-not stuck in it, too.    Those who put there, doubtless  know what for.    But, Fay, my dear," said he, changing his subject abruptly,  when he saw the child nestle her cheek against Felicia's face, " do me this one favor, please, never take that little scare-crow up in your arms—why, she has not a sound drop of blood in her whole body, and may be it is catching." Felicia quickly threw her left arm around the little form, and, full of deep compassion, pressed her to her breast. The child was frightened at Henry's angry looks, and hid her ugly little face, so that only her curly head was visible, and thus she and her protector would have stood for a beautiful picture of the Madonna.
Fellicia was about to answer indignantly, when the decorated door opened.    It could only have been on the latch, slowly and gradually it fell back and gave those stand-outside a view of the room.    It did indeed look as though a bride were expected—upon the sill of the only window stood vases full of flowers, and the young widow had just hung a long garland, in pretty festoons, above the desk. She stepped  back,  in order to inspect her work from a distance; is so doing she turned her head and caught sight of the group  standing outside.    Perhaps the Madonna-like picture displeased her, for her fine eyebrows were contracted by a frown, and she called her maid to her, who as dusting the furniture, and pointed to the door. "Will you get down this minute, Miss Anna," scolded she, as she hurried out.    "Did not your mamma tell you that you were not to go to everybody.   Her ladyship," said he, snappishly, to Felicia, "does not like it at all when Miss Anna goes to everybody and lets them kiss and pet her—she does not think it healthy."
She led the bitterly weeping child into her mother's loom, and closed the door.
"Ah, but these are a pretty sort of people!" snarled Henry, as he went down-stairs.    " Just see what you have gotten by your good-nature.    Fay, my dear!    Such folks think their sicknesses are just as fine as themselves, and that other folks ought to thank God if they are permitted to touch their vile bodies with their own sound hands."
Felicia moved along silently by his side.    Just as they entered the front hall a carriage rolled over the squaty and stopped before the house.
Ere Henry could reach the door it had been opened with a strong jerk.    It was already dark in the hall; one could only judge by the outlines that it was the substantial form of a man which stood upon the threshold.    With a few quick steps, the gentleman stood before the drawing-room door, which was opened from the inside.    An exclamation from Mrs. Hellwig's lips was heard and these dry words: "Why, John, you have been unpunctual, we did not expect you till tomorrow!"—then the door was closed, at nothing but the carriage waiting outside, and the lingering aroma of a fine cigar, showed that the apparition had been a real one.
"That was he!" whispered Felicia, laying her hand upon her terror-stricken heart.
"Let them go it now!" growled Henry at the same time, but he hushed again forthwith, and listened smilingly at the foot of the stairs.
Such a rushing and tearing around as there was above. The pretty widow fairly flew down-stairs, her blonde curls fluttering, and her white dress enveloping her swaying figure as with a cloud. She left Rose and her clumsy child far in the rear, and in a few seconds was in the drawing-room.
"I'll bet, Fay, we know now why that wee flower, the forget-me-not, was stuck in the garland!" laughed Henry, as he went out to take charge of the young gentleman's luggage.
CHAPTER XI
NEXT morning—it was still quite early—Felicia profited by a few moments of leisure to slip up to Aunt Cordelia and tell her of the eminent success of Henry's expedition to the poor joiner's family.    On the landing of the second story Henry came to meet her, grinning with heartfelt satisfaction, and with his thumb pointing back over h shoulder toward the door which he had yesterday helped to garland.    The floral decorations had vanished: a regular coil of garlands lay upon the floor, and along the wall wen ranged vases of different sorts of flowers.
"How that flew that flew down!" whispered Henry.   "One, two, —there lay the little forget-me-not on the floor — I came up just as he was standing on the ladder."
"Who?"
"Why, the professor.    He made a horrible face, for I had nailed up the things as if they had to stay there for all time, and he had to tug at them with all his might.    But only think. Fay, he gave me his hand when I bade him good-morning — but I can tell you that was a surprise to me!"
Felicia's lip curled — she was about to say something bitter, but suddenly darted around the corner into the dark corridor, for, from the inside of the chamber, she had heard quick steps approaching the door.
Afterward, as she returned from the mansard, and was about to go down-stairs, the voice of the young widow came up from the first story ; she was speaking in soft tones of lament — in sooth, it were hard to find anything more melodious than the vocal organs of this lady. "Those poor flowers!" mourned she.
"How could you think of doing such a thing for me,  Adele?" answered a manly voice.  "You know that glorifications of the sort are my horror."
It was the same cold voice that once upon a time had made a so indelibly bad impression upon little Fay; it only led deeper now, and at this moment had an admixture fault-finding chagrin.
There he went, carefully leading little Anna by the hand lowly they went down, one step at a time!    There was absolutely nothing at all in the appearance of this a man that seemed to comport with the title of professor. Such impersonations of all knowledge had been endowed, young girl's imagination, with all that was noble and exalted; but here she sought in vain for any such manifestation.    A muscular frame, as it seemed, well knitted her, with angular movements that rendered his bearing anything but elegant;   indeed it had in it something particularly uncouth and disagreeable — an observer would have been led to the opinion that that neck had never bent, even in salutation.    And how little fitted was the head to do away with this impression!   For a moment his face turned upward — that homely face, which had once corresponded so ill with the child 's preconceived idea of the distant John; it had not grown benignant in its expression. A full, crisp, reddish beard covered his chin and the lower part of his cheeks, falling down almost to his breast, and there was a deep furrow between his bushy eyebrows, deepened just at this moment by his vexation over a compliment that pleased him so little. And yet this anything but aristocratic or attractive exterior did not fail to make its impression, which was due probably to its undoubted expression of manly force and strength of will.
And now he stooped down to the little creature, that was with difficulty making her way at his side, and took her into his arms.
"Come here, my child, the poor little legs do not serve you so well as they might," said he. The words sounded amazingly mild and compassionate.
"Ah! but he is not speaking to an actor's child," thought Felicia, with a heart swelling full of bitterness.
The morning hours were full of bustle for that quiet house, the front-door bell ringing almost incessantly. In this little town, as in all others, there are people enough who like to have their every-day faces illuminated by the glory emanating from a distinguished man, without considering that the very light they court but makes their own darkness more manifest. However that may be, these visits came most opportunely, in poor Felicia's estimation, for, although she longed for nothing so ardently as to have her fate promptly decided, yet she trembled before the first collision, and suddenly felt herself not sufficiently collected and composed—every hour's respite seemed to her a, gain. But the plenipotentiary in the drawing-room, on the other hand, had a desire to see the tragedy brought upon the scenes as speedily as possible, for lunch had hardly been discussed ere Henry came into the kitchen as an envoy. He considered Felicia's dress attentively, knocked a little flour off her dark sleeve, and said with a somewhat unsteady glance:
"Your hair is a little loose at the ear, Fay—fix it up nicely; the one in yonder does not like to see anything of that sort, you know. You are to go right straight into old master's room—they are in there. Well, well, what is there to frighten a body so? Why, you are as white as a sheet. Be brave, little Fay, he cannot bite your head off!"
Felicia opened the door and softly entered what had formerly been her uncle's room. Her lips and cheeks were still colorless, and, for the moment, her face was almost ghost-like in the stillness of its repose.
Exactly as nine years ago on that stormy morning of which we know, Mrs. Hell wig sat in an arm-chair close to the window. At her side, with his back to the door, and his folded hands crossed backward stood the man who had there sentenced this creature to tread the path of servitude, and never, never suffered the least deviation from the dark line marked out before her, who had inexorably continued her punishment from the far distance, without ever asking if she were really guilty.
Felicia had, with reason, trembled before this first meeting, for now, upon sight of him, she felt herself overpowered, as it were, by an in-pouring of spite and detestation, and yet self-control had never been more needful for her than at this decisive instant.
"There is Caroline," said Mrs. Hellwig. The professor turned, and showed a greatly astonished countenance. Apparently he had never thought that the actor's child, who had once, upon this very spot, stamped her little foot and behaved like a maniac, could grow up and behave with dignity. Now, a grown girl stood there, tall and proudly erect, although her eyes were fixed upon the ground.
He advanced toward her, and moved his right arm.   Did he, perhaps, intend to shake hands with her, as he had previously done with Henry?    Her heart almost stood still at the thought, and her delicate fingers pressed the palms of her hands convulsively, while her arms hung motionless at her side; but her eyelashes were raised, and a look full of deadly coldness met the gaze of the man standing in front of her.    Just so an imbittered enemy meets his foe.    The professor must have been conscious of the import of her looks, for he involuntarily drew back, and sharply measured her whole figure from head to foot.
At this moment there was a knock at the door, and immediately afterward his widowed cousin put in her fair and laughing face.
"May I come in?" asked she, in a coaxing tone, and, ere an answer could be returned, she stood in the middle of the room.
"Ah! am I come just in time for the painful audience?" asked she. "My dear Caroline, you will have to learn now that there is another will in the world beside your own, and poor Wellner's case will, at last, be decided."
"Pray, Adele, let John speak for himself!" cried Mrs. Hellwig, quite shortly and ungraciously.
"For the present, let us ascertain this one point," said the professor. He crossed his arms over his breast, and leaned against a table. "Will you tell me why you reject that honorable man's offer?"
His quiet, unimpassioned eyes rested searchingly upon the young girl.
"Because I despise him! He is a miserable hypocrite, who uses piety as a cloak for his meanness and avarice," replied she, firmly and steadily; for she had made up her mind now to parry his blows by perfect candor.
"Good heavens, what slander!" cried the young widow, clasping her white hands in the violence of her indignation, and turning her great blue eyes up to heaven, as though to appeal against the temerity of such sinfulness. Mrs. Hellwig, however, gave a short derisive laugh.
"There; John, you have a specimen of the ways and manners of your so-called ward!" cried she. "This month of hers is always ready with expressions of contempt and the like—I can testify to that. Make it short! You are not going to move her by one single inch, and I take no pleasure in hearing the good people slandered who frequent my house!"
The professor made no reply. While he slowly stroked his beard with his remarkably pretty, small hands, his gaze was fastened upon his cousin, who still stood in the attitude of a praying seraph. It almost seemed as though he had heard nothing but her outcry, and his lips were slightly curled; but who could read that unique and singular countenance?
"You have made wonderful advance in the study of character during the few weeks of your stay here, Adele!" said he. "When one can appear as solicitor in that fashion—"
"Do, pray, John," burst in the young widow, eagerly. "You do not imagine that any particular interest—" she hushed suddenly and flushed crimson.
There was no mistaking now the twinkle of amusement in the professor's eyes.
"All the ladies who visit my aunt agree unanimously in thinking Wellner an honorable man," added she, after a pause, going on to defend the position of the ladies.   "The missionary money all goes through his hands, and the faithful find no fault with him—"
"Whereupon, you are ready to vouch for his reliability," interposed the professor, breaking her off short in her remarks.    "I am not acquainted with the man," said he, turning to Felicia, "and therefore cannot know how far you are justifiable in your accusation." "John!" burst in Mrs. Hellwig angrily. "Excuse me, mother, we will talk together in private after awhile," said he, gently and soothingly.     "Nobody will force you," continued he, turning to the young girl. "So far I have never yielded my right to decide your affairs for you; in the first place, because I knew you were under a guardianship in which I had unbounded confidence, and then, because your character was dangerously impulsive, liable to lead you astray and incline you to a course anything but calculated to further your true interests.    My power, however, extends not to this question; in some respects I cannot even blame you, for you are young, and, as I hear he is of advanced old age—that is not seemly.    A second stone of stumbling is the difference of station—for the present he will overlook your origin—second thoughts are sure to be sober ones, and any disturbance of the social equilibrium is sure to avenge itself."
How rational all this sounded—and how heartless! She could imagine him at this moment as the composer of these written regulations, that had never lost sight of the unhallowed ground whence the child of actors had sprung. He left his former place and stood before the young girl, whose lips quivered as they parted in a bitter smile.
"You have made our task a hard one," said he, as he rubbed his forefinger. "You have not gained my mother's affection, and, as I take it, have had no desire so to do. As matters lie, then, you will not yourself desire to make your home any longer in this house?"
"I would prefer to leave it this very hour." "I believe it; for you have always shown plainly enough that our strict and conscientious solicitude for you was intolerable."   There was a touch of pique and annoyance in his tone now.    "It has been labor utterly lost on our part to attempt to bridle the gypsy element in your nature. Well, you shall have what you wish, but I do not deem my task as yet discharged. I have first to make an effort to find your natural protectors. "
"You had a different opinion on this point once," remarked Mrs. Hell wig, scornfully.
"It has altered in the natural course of things, as you see, mother," answered he, quietly.
Felicia was silent, and looked down. She knew that this step had already been taken. Aunt Cordelia had taken it long ago. A summons to the conjurer, D'Orlowsky, and the relations of his wife had been printed in one of the first newspapers, and copied by all the most respectable sheets; but, up to this time, no one had appeared. This, indeed, the young girl did not feel called upon to tell.
"I shall take the needful, steps this very day," continued the professor, "and believe that a space of two months will be sufficient time to allow for the clearing up of this matter. Until then you are still under my guardianship, and to consider yourself in my mother's service. However, if, as I fear, none of your relatives should appear, then —"
"Then I sue for immediate freedom, after the lapse of the stated period!" interrupted Felicia, eagerly.
"No, that sounds too abominable!" cried the young widow in a burst of indignation. "Why, you actually behave as if you had been put to the torture and crucified in this house of peace and Christian compassion! What ingratitude!"
"Do you think, then, that you can do without our further assistance?" asked the professor, without paying any heed to the young widow's gush of indignation.
"I am thankful to believe so."
"Well, then," said he, curtly, after a moment of silence, "after the expiration of two months, you shall be free to do as you choose!" He turned off and walked to the window.
"You can go!" were Mrs. Hellwig's orders, given in a rude tone.
Felicia left the room.
"So, another battle of eight weeks' duration!" whispered she, as she crossed the entrance-hall. "It will be a battle for life and death!"
CHAPTER XII.
THREE days had elapsed since the professor's arrival; they had completely metamorphosed the monotonous life usually led by the residents of that old mansion, but contrary to her every expectation, for Felicia they had been days of quiet.    The professor had not again concerned himself about her at all, and, it seemed, wished to confine his s intercourse with her to that first and solitary interview.  She drew a breath of relief, and yet—singularly enough—she had never felt more humiliated and injured than now.   He had occasionally passed her in the hall without looking at her—or rather he seemed vexed and made a wry face that was not at all becoming to him.    In spite of his entreaties and representations, Mrs. Hellwig would insist upon summoning him into the parlor, when visitors from her circle of acquaintances asked for him.    He made his appearance, indeed, as in duty bound, but was abstracted and anything but an agreeable companion.   Many others, however, came daily, who were taken up to the second  floor by Henry. Persons seeking medical aid, often poor, miserable wretches, whom, at any other time, Fredericka would most unceremoniously have driven from the door.    Now, however, to the vexation of the old cook, and equally in opposition to the will and desires of Mrs. Hellwig, they were conducted over the finely polished, neatly kept staircase, and found up there, without distinction, admission, and a hearing.    The professor had gained his reputation mainly as an oculist, for he had succeeded in effecting cures, pronounced by other distinguished members of the medical faculty to be impossible.    The name of the still very young man had accordingly become suddenly well known to fame.
Mrs. Hellwig had committed the cleaning and dusting of her son's room to Felicia. The small apartment looked entirely changed since he had been its inmate; previously furnished quite comfortably, it would now have done for a hermit's cell. The same fate that had overtaken the floral decorations was shared by the gay calico curtains—they had fallen directly beneath the professor's hands, as obstructions to the entrance of light—just so a few inartistic daubs of paintings, representing battle-scenes, had been made to vacate their places on the walls, and in their stead its occupant had brought up from a dark corner in the entry a fine old copper-plate engraving, and placed it over his desk, in spite of its cracked and dingy wooden frame. Verily, it was a masterpiece of the engraver's art, and represented a beautiful young mother, tenderly wrapping up her child in her fur-trimmed silk cloak. The cloth cover on the sofa-table and several embroidered cushions had been removed as "dust-catchers" and upon a bureau, instead of Sevres porcelain figures, stood the professor's books, pressed closely up together and symmetrically arranged. No dog-eared leaves were to be seen there, not a corner rubbed off, and yet they had been much used, without a doubt: they were bound in very uncouth fashion, and were in uniform according to the language in which they were written—-thus: Latin, gray; German, brown, etc. "Just so he tries to regulate the souls of men," thought Felicia, bitterly, when, for the first time, she saw his rows of books, "and woe to that one which is found outside of its appointed color.''
The professor drank his cup of coffee every morning with his mother and cousin, but then went immediately to his own room and worked there till noon. The very first morning he had refused the wine which Mrs. Hellwig had sent up for his refreshment, and instead of it must always have a carafe of water standing ready for his use. It seemed as though he purposely avoided being waited upon. He never rang the bell, and if the water for him to drink was no longer fresh enough he would go down into the yard himself and fill up his caraffe.
On the morning of the fourth day letters came for the professor. Henry had gone out, and so Felicia was sent up with them to the second story. She hesitated before entering, as she heard some one talking inside. It was the voice of a woman, who seemed to be winding up what had been, perhaps, a long conversation.
"Dr. Bohm has spoken to me of your son's suffering from his eyes," answered the professor in a kindly tone. "I will see what is to be done for him."
"But oh! honored sir, such a great man as you are—"
"Let that be, madame!" interposed he, so gruffly that she was silenced immediately by fear. "I shall come tomorrow and examine his eyes," added he more mildly.
"But we are poor people; our income is but narrow—"
"You have told me that twice already, dear madame!" interrupted   the professor,  this time impatiently.    "Go now, my time is more important.    If I can be of any service to your son you may depend upon me.    Good-morning!"
The woman came out, and Felicia crossed the threshold. The professor sat at his desk, and already his pen was flying over the paper. He had, however, seen the girl enter, and without lifting his eyes from his work, he stretched out his left hand after the letters. He broke open one of these, while Felicia again moved toward the door.
"By the way," called out he, already half and half buried in his letter, "who dusts this room?" "I do," answered the young girl standing still. "Well, then, I must request you to respect my desk more in future.    It is very unpleasant to me for even one book to be moved from its place, and here one is even missing."
Felicia composedly stepped up to a table upon which lay several piles of books.
"What is the title of the book?" asked she, quietly.
Something like a smile crossed the professor's grave face. This question sounded peculiarly simple and useless in the mouth of a maid-servant in a physician's study.
"You will hardly find it—it is a French book," replied he. "'Cruveilhier—Anatomie du Systeme Nerveux ' is on the back," added he, the muscles of his face again twitching.
Felicia forthwith drew out one of the books, which lay in a pile between several other French works.
"Here it is," said she, "lying, for that matter, exactly where you left it.    I never disturb the arrangement of your books."
The professor rested his left hand upon the table, turned with a jerk, and looked the young girl full in the face.
"Do you understand French?" asked he, suddenly and sharply.
Felicia was startled; she had betrayed herself. She not only understood French, in fact, but could speak it fluently —the Old Ma'm'selle had been an excellent instructress. Now she had to answer, and answer decidedly, too, for those keen gray eyes -were riveted upon her face, and would have detected falsehood, even if she had been tempted to resort to it—she must speak the truth. "I have been taught it," replied she.
"Ah, yes. I remember, now, until your ninth year; and some of what you learned then has stuck to you," said he, while he rubbed his forehead with his hand.
Felicia held her peace.
"Ah, that was the unhappy cause of the shipwreck of the plan of training devised by my mother and myself," he continued. "And because we had our opinion with regard to that matter, you despise us, and look upon us as your tormentors, and Heaven knows what all. Is not this so?"
Felicia struggled with herself for a moment, but bitterness of spirit conquered. She opened her stiff, cold lips, and said, calmly, "I have every reason to do so."
For an instant his eyebrows were knitted, as though from hot displeasure; but perhaps he was reminded of many a short and disobliging answer that, as a physician, he had patiently received from refractory patients. The young girl standing there before him was a sufferer, too, in his estimation—from an error, though. Assuredly we may attribute to this reflection the calmness with which he said:
"Well, I can exonerate you from the charge of obduracy brought against you, after this. You are more than candid. For the rest, we shall know how to console ourselves for your ill opinion of us."
He again took up his letter, and Felicia departed. When she stood upon the threshold of the open door the reader darted a glance after her. The vestibule was full of warm sunshine, and the maiden's form stood there in the darker chamber, like a portrait upon a gold background. As yet her figure was lacking in that roundness and fullness which are so indispensable to a type of perfectly developed womanly beauty; nevertheless the outlines were soft, and displayed an indescribable grace of movement, we may say, that liability with which the poets are wont to endow the airy and ethereal creatures of their imagination. And what glorious hair she had! Commonly it appeared to be chestnut brown, but, when a ray of sunlight fell upon it, as happened just now, then it gleamed and glistened like reddish gold. There was nothing in its arrangement, however, to remind of her mother's long, floating tresses, as they had escaped from beneath her helmet. Felicia's rather short but abundant hair, forming wave after wave, was evidently with difficulty confined into that thick, plain knot at the back of her head. Individual ringlets were perpetually freeing themselves, and falling; as they now did, upon her pure, white neck.
The professor again bent over his work; but the flow of thought, interrupted a while ago by his townswoman, would not return directly to the right channel. He rubbed his forehead with vexation, and drank a glass of water; 'twas in vain. Finally, worried at the distractions to which he had been subject, he threw his pen down on the table, took his hat from its nail, and went down-stairs.
Could the head of the blackamoor, that had for years served his learned master as a pen-wiper, have stretched his great, grinning mouth still wider, he would surely have done so now from sheer astonishment.    There lay the pen full of fresh ink, and the unhappy blackamoor longed in vain for the moisture and the accustomed satisfaction of cleaning that potent nib with the tail of his coat.    Was such a thing ever heard of?    Why, the painfully exact man was actually absent-minded.
"Mother," said the professor, entering her sitting-room, as he passed by, "I wish that you would not send that young girl up to me with any more messages; let Henry attend to that, and if he is not in I can wait."
"You see," replied his mother, triumphantly, "that creature has become unendurable to you in three days' time, and yet yon condemned me to put up with her for nine years!"
Her son silently shrugged his shoulders, and prepared to withdraw.
"The instruction that she received up to the time of my father's death ceased entirely then, did it?" asked he, once more turning around.
"What foolish questions you do ask, John!" cried Mrs. Hellwig, pettishly. "Did I not write explicitly enough to you on this very point; and I thought, too, I spoke to you about it, on my visit to Bonn? The school-books were all sold, and I burned her copy-books with my own hands, without loss of time."
"And what sort of company has she kept?" "What sort of company?   Why, properly only Fredericka and Henry; she did not herself want it to be otherwise." Now appeared that cruelly malicious feature in this woman's face, whereby the upper lip was slightly raised so as to expose one of her front teeth. "I could not, of course, give my consent to let her eat at my own table and stay in my room," she continued; "I could not forget that she had been the creature to thrust herself in between your father and myself, and then she was everlastingly proud and unbearable. To cap the climax I had selected the two daughters of a Christian tradesman as suitable associates for her; but you must know that she declared to me that she would have nothing to do with those people, who were wolves in sheep's clothing, etc. Never mind. In the eight weeks with which you have saddled yourself you will see enough to make you open your eyes wide with astonishment. "
The professor left the house to go out and take a long walk.
On the afternoon of the same day Mrs. Hellwig expected several ladies—chiefly strangers, visitors to the baths—to take coffee with her. It was to be served in the garden; and, as Fredericka had been suddenly taken sick, Felicia was sent out alone to make the proper arrangements. Speedily she made every requisite preparation. On the large gravel square, under the shelter of a tall fir-tree, stood the beautifully set coffee-table, and in the kitchen of the summer-house hissed and bubbled the water, in anticipation of its transformation into Mocha coffee, that favorite of all beverages. The young girl leaned against an open window and looked out with meditative sadness. How lovely it looked out-of-doors, how green the turf and brilliant the flower-beds, while the breezes fanned her cheek as sweetly and softly as though no devastating autumn winds had ever swept over the scene, no winter frost ever spun its fatal crystals around the drooping heads of perishing flowers. Years ago shrubbery and flower-beds had bloomed just as gayly for him, whose warm, tender heart was now crumbling into dust; for him, who was ever ready to lend a helping hand wherever it was needed, whether by springing blossoms or human beings in their wretchedness and want. The fresh flowers of today smiled now just as merrily into other, cold faces, and men spoke no more of him.
Here he had found a refuge for himself and the little orphan from the withering glances and slanderous tongues in the town; and not only in the glad summer-time; for, while spring was still struggling with winter outside, here a bright fire had crackled in a white porcelain stove; a thick carpet on the floor had warmed their feet, while the bashes pressed their swelling buds against the heated panes of glass, whereon a few rash flakes of snow were irremediably melting into nothingness, and from above the broad but bare garden inclosure peeped in the half snow-covered mountain, with its familiar crown of poplar upon its brow. Dear, precious memories!    And over yonder stood the nut-trees, their leaves hardly opened as yet; at this moment they were hanging down idly and motionless as though rocked to slumber by the warmth of the golden sunshine. What had all this once whispered to the child?    Sweet, blessed promises of the world and the future, dreams as clear and unshadowed as the cloudless sky overhead; and then it .had suddenly grown, dark and lowering above the guiltless head of the forsaken child;  a glaring flash of lightning   had  revealed  knowledge  that had henceforth driven into black obscurity those flattering dreams that nature had been whispering.
Approaching voices and the creaking of the garden gate startled Felicia out of her mournf ul reveries.   Through the corner window toward the north she could see the professor enter the garden in company with another gentleman. They came slowly onward.    The other gentleman had for some time been quite a frequent visitor in Mrs. Hellwig's drawing-room, belonging to a very respectable family that had long sustained friendly relations with the house of Hellwig.    Nearly of the same age as the professor, he had likewise been trained on the Rhine, at the Institute of that very strictly pietistic relation of the Hellwigs, of whom we have heard so often already.    Afterward, the two had been fellow students at the University, although, indeed, for only a short time, where they had always  maintained friendly relations, although entirely dissimilar in character and modes of thought.    "While John Hellwig was elected to a professor's chair almost immediately after he had completed his studies, young Francke had gone traveling. Only a short time ago he had returned, in obedience to a summons from his parents, to stand his examination for a law degree.     He was now an attorney-at-law in. his native city, awaiting clients and the fortune that they were toj bring.
As he drew nearer it was seen that he would have stood I for the model of an almost perfectly handsome man; his] face was intellectual, and his form tali and well proportioned.    Perhaps his very beautifully shaped head, with its ! refined and somewhat delicate and soft outlines,  might have struck one as effeminate, had it not set so firmly and ] steadily upon his shoulders, and been supported by decided, although very   elegant   movements  of  the  whole  body, which threw this slight blemish into the background.
He was just taking his cigar from his mouth, and now examining it attentively, then flung it contemptuously away. The professor took out his cigar-case and offered it to him.
" Heaven forbid!" cried the lawyer, while with comical gesture he held both hands out deprecatingly. " I could not be so indiscreet as to rob some poor little heathen in China or God knows where."
The professor smiled.
" For, as I knew you of old," continued the other, " you used never to deviate from your self-imposed task of self-abnegation in this, viz., you allowed yourself three cigars daily, but conscientiously would never smoke but one, while the money for the other two went into your missionary savings-box."
''' Yes, I preserve the habit still," assented the professor, with a quiet smile; "but the money has a different destination, it belongs wholly to my poor patients."
" You do not say so! You, the stanch advocate of pietistic effort, the most faithful of the pupils of our Ehenish school despot! Do you thus carry out his precepts, you renegade?"
The professor shrugged his shoulders. He paused in his walk and thoughtfully shook the ashes off his cigar.
" As a physician, one learns to think differently of humanity and the relative duties of individuals," said he. " I have always kept in view the one grand aim of making myself truly useful. In order to attain this I have had to forget much, and reject much."
They walked on further, and their voices died away. But upon the gravel walk which they were traversing the brooding sun shone rather oppressively, and so, although absorbed in their conversation, they turned back almost instinctively to the broad stone-paved walk, running along the side of the house, which was overshadowed by a group of acacias, that made it cool and shady.
" Do not contend!" Felicia heard the professor say in a tone somewhat more animated than usual. " You will accomplish nothing by it. Exactly, as years ago, I used to allow myself to be either horribly bored or annoyed in the society of women, and—I can tell you this—my intercourse with the so-called fair sex, as a physician, has not at all tended to elevate my opinion of it. "What a mixture of thoughtlessness and weakness of character!"
" You are bored in ladies' society, very naturally!" exclaimed young  Francke, energetically, standing  still beneath the corner window.    '' You purposely seek out the intellectually plain, not to say simple. You. despise modern female education—in many respects your prejudices are well grounded, too—neither am I a friend to strumming on the piano and senseless French babbling, but one must not indiscriminately condemn the good with the evil.    In our day, when the human mind is almost daily striking out into new and unsuspected paths, where every faculty of soul and body is stimulated to utmost activity by beholding the mighty strides which the human race is making toward perfection, you would have woman shut up, if possible, behind the distaff of the middle ages, seated familiarly hi the same circle with her maids, and having a mind confined to their narrow range of ideas.    This is not only unjust, it is positively foolish.    Woman has the soul of her son under control at a stage when it is most susceptible, receiving impressions just like wax, and carrying them just as indelibly through the whole of life as if they had been cut upon marble.    Encourage women to think seriously, widen the circle which you egotists are drawing in narrowly enough around their souls, and which you call their womanly destiny, and you will see that vanity and weakness will no longer attach themselves to their characters."
'' Dear friend, I shall assuredly not set out upon that path," said the professor, sarcastically, as he moved slowly onward.
" I well know that you have a different conviction. You think all this is to be attained without effort, by means of a pious wife. My much-honored professor, I can tell you that, no more than yourself, would I like an irreligious companion for life. A woman without piety is a flower without perfume. But, beware! You take it for granted that, being piously reared, she will be all that heart requires, and suddenly you will awake to find a tyranny established in your household, such as a less pious woman could never have instituted. Under the pretext of piety all the latent infirmities of feminine character may be easily cloaked, and so fostered. One may be cruel, revengeful, and quite palpably haughty, too, and yet condemn and destroy the glorious and beautiful through a blind zealotism —all this in the name of the Lord, and in the so-called interests of the heavenly kingdom."
" You go too far."
" Not at all. You will have to learn yet that the reasoning power must be cultivated, and the softer sensibilities brought into exercise, if piety in a woman is to prove a real blessing to us."
" Such are aims to which it is not at all in my power to contribute," replied the professor coldly. " My science claims me and my life so fully—"
" Ah! but who have we here?" interrupted the lawyer in a low tone, as he pointed toward the garden gate. There behind the trellised door appeared the young widow, accompanied by her child and Mrs. Hell wig. " Is she not the perfect embodiment of your ideal"' continued he, with imperceptible irony. " Simple—she always appears in her white muslin, which, by the way, becomes her excellently; pious—who would doubt it after seeing her in church, sitting there with those beautiful eyes turned up toward heaven ? She despises all knowledge, thought, and reflection, because they might hinder the progress of her knitting or embroidery—for equality in rank you require with equal rigidity as a constituent of a happy marriage—in short, she is plainly designated as the one whom you—"
" You are severe, and never could bear Adele," interrupted the professor irritably. "I am afraid, mainly because she is the daughter of a teacher, who used to keep you very strictly. She is good-natured, harmless, and an excellent mother."
He advanced toward the approaching ladies, and saluted them with cordial civility.
CHAPTER XIII.
ERE long the graveled square was alive with graceful female forms, who, for the most part, arrayed in sheer muslin or gauze, flitted hither and thither like white butterflies. The dark wall of stiff fir-trees furnished an admirable background for these charming, light-winged creatures; silvery laughter and lively talk rang through the pleasant air, now and then interrupted by the more sonorous tones of a gentleman's voice.
Upon a hint from Mrs. Hellwig, Felicia came in, bringing the coffee-tray.
"My motto is, 'Simple and cheap!'" she heard the young widow exclaim, in a lively tone, as she drew near. "In summer I am principled against wearing a dress whose material costs me more than three dollars."
"But you forget, my dear," objected another lady, who was also young and very much dressed, while she mischievously glanced at the toilet which had just been boasted of as so simple, "that you have spent three times the value of the material of your dress in those rich trimmings of lace and embroidery."
"Pshaw! who could calculate the value of that cloud-like drapery, by its prosaic equivalent in dollars and cents?" cried young Francke, amused at catching the hostile look exchanged between the two ladies. "Why, one would suppose that it might bear the ladies heavenward, were it not for such heavy gold bracelets as this, which must indubitably bear them down again to earth!"
His eye was fastened, with obvious interest, upon the wrist of the young widow, who was sitting near him; it was drawn back as though by instinct, and the forehead and cheeks of its mistress were, for a moment, suffused with red.
"Do you know, madame," said he, "that for the last half-hour I have been intensely interested in the examination of your bracelet? It is of rare workmanship, in the antique style. But what particularly piques my curiosity is the puzzling inscription, there in the middle of the wreath."
The lady's color had already subsided to its ordinary delicate rose tint, and her placid eyes looked softly up, while, with perfect freedom from embarrassment, she loosened her bracelet and held it out to him.
Just now, Felicia was standing behind the lawyer. She could conveniently see the ornament in his hands. Strange! down to the smallest particulars it was the same bracelet that lay in the Old Ma'm'selle's secret drawer, and had undoubtedly played a mysterious part in her life's history. The only difference was, that this one was much smaller in circumference, for it encircled quite closely the fair widow's delicate wrist.
"daz irliebe ist ane kranc, Die hat got zesamme geben flf em wtinneclichez leben," was read off fluently by the lawyer.
"Remarkable!" cried he; "this stanza has no beginning. Ah, yes! it is a fragment from the Niebelungenlied, and I am pretty sure from Ulrich von Liehtenstein's poem, ' Constant Love;' in the translation the whole stanza runs somewhat so:
"'In unison, when two hearts beat
With fond devotion true, And wedded are, their life is sweet,
And love forever new. To them God hath a rare gift sent— Delightsome days of blest content."
"This bracelet must certainly have its fellow, for this is evidently indicated by the beginning of the stanza," remarked he with great animation of manner. "Is not the complementary piece in your possession?"'
"No," replied the lady, stooping over her work, while the ornament passed from hand to hand.
"And how did you come by this very remarkable piece of jewelry, Adele?'' asked the professor from another part of the circle.
Again the lady blushed slightly. "Papa gave it to me not long ago," answered she—" goodness knows how old it is."
She again took possession of her bracelet, clasped it round her arm, and, as she did so, addressed a question to one of the ladies that directed the conversation into an entirely different channel.
While the attention of the whole company had been directed to the interesting bracelet, Felicia had made the circuit of the table, all having helped themselves without taking any notice of the bearer of the coffee-tray.    She thus returned to the kitchen unobserved, as she had come.    In response to little Anna's entreaties, who was playing about in the shade near the house, she stopped a moment, and tried to break off one of the lower branches of an acacia-tree standing near, in so doing bending back her elastic form, and lifting high her arms; a more advantageous posture for the display of a faultless figure could hardly have been chosen, than that which the young girl unconsciously assumed for some few seconds.    The lawyer suddenly took his eyeglass, for he was quite near-sighted.    The diligently stitching widow, however, was watchfully observant of the direction taken by young Francke's dark eyes, which were fastened, with evident admiration, upon the youthful form under the acacia-tree.    After Felicia entered the house the young man let his eyeglass drop.     He had obviously a question upon the point of his tongue, with which he was about to turn to Mrs. Hellwig, had not the young widow hastily interposed.    She asked of him the particulars of an accident which had befallen him in the course of his travels, and thus cleverly touched upon a subject that he was too well pleased to dilate upon.
After awhile, she arose noiselessly, and went over to the house.
"Dear Caroline," said she, on entering the kitchen, "it is not worth while for you to wait on us over there—ah! I see—there is a chafing-dish, that will do splendidly! Fill the pot with hot coffee, and I will take it back with me and attend to the pouring out myself; it will be more pleasant so for the guests, and to speak candidly, you look too badly for anything in that faded calico gown. How can you bear to go before gentlemen in that abominably short frock? It is really indecent—do you not feel it yourself, child?"
This despised garment was the best in the girl's possession—her so-called Sunday dress. It was indeed much the worse for wear—she had outgrown it, and it was, moreover, faded; but on the other hand it had been done up beautifully, and was faultlessly neat.
That she should now be reproached for what she could not help, and had only learned to submit to, in silence, through the exercise of the greatest self-control, made her smile bitterly; but she said nothing; for she felt that any attempt at self-defense would have been out of place here, and even ridiculous.
"When the young widow returned to the coffee-table, she found the company busily engaged upon the topic of conversation from which she had before taken so much pains to divert them.
"Strikingly beautiful!" repeated Mrs. Hellwig with a rude laugh. "Fy, my dear Francke, what am I to think of you! Striking: yes, I grant you that; but striking in a manner that is not proper for a young girl. Only behold that pale face and untidily kept hair! Those forward manners and unrefined ways, those eyes that boldly look respectable people out of countenance—such are the legacies left her by a miserable, unprincipled mother. Kind begets kind! and one of mean race is sure to expose one's origin.
I have had bitter experience of what I say; for nine long years have I been trying to redeem a soul for the Lord— his obdurate creature has put all my endeavors to the blush."
"Ah! never mind, auntie, you will soon be relieved of that now!" said the younger widow soothingly, while she poured out the coffee and handed it around. "A few more weeks, and that disturber of the peace leaves your house forever. I, too, alas! fear that the seed has, in this ease, fallen upon stony ground—assuredly nothing lofty can be expected of an ungrateful person, whose only effort, hitherto, has been to cast off the restraints of morality and good manners. As for the rest, we who have been blessed in coming of good parentage should not enter into judgment too strictly with those who have levity in their blood. When, by and by, you go traveling again, Mr. Francke, you may chance, under a foreign sky, to come across my aunt's former maid, as a tight-rope dancer, or queen of the circus ring."
"She does not seem like such a person as you describe," said the professor, in his quiet, positive tone, So far he had maintained a consistent silence; his opposition, therefore, which sounded very decided, came in with twofold effect. Mrs. Hellwig turned abruptly and angrily upon her son, and the young widow's eyes lost for the moment their stereotyped softness of expression; quickly recovering herself, however, she smilingly shook her curly head, and was opening her lips, doubtless to say something kind and friendly; but she was prevented—a loud cry from Anna echoed over the lawn, and in consequence of what her mother saw, upon turning around, she, too, uttered a shriek of horror.    The child came running toward her mother, as fast as her clumsy legs would carry her.   In her right hand (stretched out in great distress) she clutched a bundle of matches, but her dress was in bright flames.    We have said that her mother uttered a shriek of horror, at the same time that her disordered vision took a survey of her own inflammable toilet—as though in absence of mind, with deadly pale face, she stretched her hands deprecatingly toward the child, and with one bound had vanished behind the protecting screen of evergreens.
The company of ladies, clad in "cloud-like drapery" scattered in all directions, like a scared covey of partridges; Mrs. Hellwig alone moved forward bravely to the rescue of the child, as did also the two gentlemen, with yet greater activity; but they came too late.    Felicia was already there. Spreading out her clothes, she wrapped them closely about the burning child, and thus sought to stifle the flames. They were too strong; the young girl's thin calico dress took fire too, the flames mounting up with devouring fierceness.    Swiftly resolved, she pressed the child to her breast, flew across the lawn, up to the dam, and cast herself with her into the rushing waters of the mill-race.
Danger of death and deliverance had met together in the course of a few seconds, and ere the two gentlemen had comprehended the girl's design, the fire was extinguished. They reached the dam at the instant when Felicia, again standing erect, and holding the child on her right arm, with her left caught at the boughs of a hazel bush, in order to hold herself up, and resist the force of the current, which was very strong here.    At the same time with the gentlemen appeared the child's mother at the dam.
"Save my child! save my Nannie!" cried she, in accents of despair, while it seemed as though she would run straight into the water.
"You need not wet the soles of your shoes, Adele, you might easily catch cold," said the professor, with cutting irony, as he quickly climbed down, and offered Felicia both hands, in order to support her; but slowly he let them drop again, for the perfectly composed features of the young girl's face had suddenly undergone a change, her brow became contracted, and his eyes met that look of cold hostility with which he was already familiar. Averting her face, she held little Anna out to him, and then accepting the lawyer’s hand, with a faint smile of gratitude swung herself upon the bank.
The professor carried the child to the house, undressed her, with the help of her weeping mother, and searched for the supposed burns, but, queerly enough, she was found to be almost entirely unhurt; her left hand alone, from which the fire had gone out, as she herself tearfully said, showed signs of having been burned. While her mother was standing in the kitchen, the little girl had, unperceived, taken the match-box from the hearth. On kindling one of the matches out in the garden, a bit of rag that had been tied around her thumb, on account of a cut, had taken fire; this she had tried to put out against her dress, and thus the catastrophe had ensued.
The scattered ladies now came back in company. An admixture of lamentations and congratulations for the mother of the saved child streamed from all their soft lips, and the poor angel was overwhelmed with caresses.
"But, my good Caroline," said the young widow, turning with a gentle reproach to Felicia, who was standing by, anxiously waiting to hear the result of the examination, "could you not have just given a little oversight to Nannie while she was in the garden?"
The reproach was too unjust.
"A few minutes before you had forbidden me to leave the house," replied Felicia, fixing one of her dark, penetrating looks upon the lady, while the flush of indignation mounted to her cheeks.
"Eh? How was that, Adele?" asked Mrs. Hellwig in surprise.
"Dear me, auntie," answered the young widow, without showing the least sign of embarrassment, "you need have no trouble in understanding why when you look at that hair. I wanted to spare her and ourselves the pain that slovenliness always occasions."
Felicia put her hand up to her head in surprise, for she remembered having arranged her hair with scrupulous care, but her comb (that would never stay firmly fixed on account of the weight of her refractory tresses) had dropped out, and was most probably, at this moment, lying at the bottom of the mill-race. Loosed from confinement, her wonderfully beautiful hair now encircled her, as with a halo of glory, while here and there drops of water glistened upon it like scattered pearls.
"And is this, ladies, the best thank-offering that you can bring to the rescuing hand that brought your child uninjured through fire and water?" asked the lawyer sharply—who, up to this time, had kept his eye almost fixedly upon Felicia.
"How can you entertain such unjust thoughts against me, Mr. Francke?" retorted the deeply mortified young widow. "A man, indeed, can never rightly comprehend the indignation against one who has neglected to spare her child from a single pang, although, at the time, it gratefully admits that her oversight was atoned for, by her subsequent rescue of her. My dear Caroline," said she, turning to the young girl, "I shall never forget you for what you have done today. I should like to show my gratitude to you at this very moment." Quickly, as though following some sudden impulse, she unclasped her bracelet, and offered it to Felicia. "There, take it by way of preliminary—I value it very highly; but for the rescue of my Nannie I could joyfully sacrifice what I hold most precious."
Deeply wounded, Felicia pushed back the hand that was about to put the bracelet on her arm.
"I thank you," said she, with that proud throwing back of the head which would-be humble believers had always found so offensive in the actor’s child; "I cannot submit to be paid for an act of common humanity, but still less inclined am I to accept such a sacrifice as this. You say yourself that I have simply atoned for an omission of duty, and hence you are not in the least indebted to me, madame."
Mrs. Hellwig had already taken the bracelet away from her niece. 
"You are not in sober earnest, Adele!" scolded she, peevishly, without paying any heed to Felicia’s proud rejection of the offer made her. "What is the girl to do with a thing like that? Give her a dress of strong, stout gingham—that will be much more serviceable to her—and there let that settle the matter—enough said!
After these last words, the lawyer took his departure. 
He picked up his hat, and passed under the open window beneath which Felicia was standing.
"I think the whole set of us are treating you very cruelly!" cried he to her. "In the first place, you are insulted with the offer of filthy lucre, and then we look on unconcerned while you are standing there in wet clothes. I’ll run to town and have brought out what is needful for you and the little incendiary.
He bowed and withdrew.
"He is a fool!" said Mrs. Hellwig, angrily, to the ladies, who looked after him in chagrin, and evidently witnessed his departure with regret. 
Occupied with the child, the professor had not opened his lips while the question of reward was being debated; but a stander-by, who was at all observant, would have perceived his color deepen at the moment when the proffer of the bracelet was made with so very ill a grace. Most assuredly this man was not made for a ladies’ doctor, nor indeed for one of those refined medical practitioners who make it their special study to pander to the caprices and whims of women of high rank. He was abominably inconsiderate where the fair sex was concerned. It was, of course, perfectly natural for them to have been frightened almost to death by the child’s accident, and equally natural that they should have felt the greatest anxiety to learn its probable results; but to all the sympathetic questions put to him by the ladies, this man of science had only returned short, dry answers; and furthermore, he had replied with cutting sarcasm to some of the most harmless little remarks. 
He had had the child enveloped in a thick warm shawl, and now delivered her over into their gentle hands, and walked to the door. Felicia had retired to the furthest corner of the room, and there believed herself to be wholly unobserved. With her shoulders drawn up, she leaned against the wall; her face had become deadly pale, while the look of her eyes from beneath her knitted eyebrows and compressed lips showed unmistakable signs of sever suffering. She had a considerable burn upon her arm, that was, indeed, occasioning her intense pain.
Just as he was about to close the door the professor sent back a scrutinizing glance into the room he was leaving; his eye fell upon the maiden, whom he looked at keenly for one minute, and then, with a few long strides, he stood before her.
"You are in pain, are you not?" asked he, quickly.
"It can be borne," answered she with trembling lips, that convulsively closed again.
"The flame hurt you?"
"Yes—on my arm." In spite of her suffering, she seemed to repel any offer of assistance, and turned her face to the window—she could not look into eyes that had been abhorrent to her from the time of early childhood. He tarried for a moment; but sense of duty as a physician conquered.
"Will you not accept of my help?" asked he, in a tone that was studiously considerate and kingly.
"I will not trouble you," answered she with a frown. "I can help myself as soon as I get back to town."
"Well, as you choose," said he coldly. "And for the rest, I would remind you that, for the present, my mother has a claim upon your time and your strength. For that reason, you should not wantonly risk your health." As he spoke these last words, he avoided looking at Felicia.
"I do not forget that," answered she more mildly, for she felt confident that this reference to her duty was not made in order to humiliate her, but obviously in order to persuade her to accept medical aid. "I am mindful of our agreement," added she, "and, to the very last, you will find me in the place to which I have been assigned."
"Why, John, are your services as a doctor called into play here, too?" asked the irrepressible widow, advancing.
"No," said he briefly. "But what are you doing here still, Adele?" continued he with disapprobation in his tone.  "I told you, only a little while ago, that Anna must be carried directly into the open air, and cannot understand what you mean by tarrying here in the sultry room."
He went out at the door while his cousin made haste to take the child in her arms, and all the ladies followed her. All this while Mrs. Hellwig had tranquilly kept her place at the coffee-table, knitting away as though two human lives had not been imperiled within the space of time that it had taken her to add a few more rounds to the stocking that was so steadily growing beneath her fingers. But why should her equanimity be shaken, seeing that it was based upon iron nerves and a heart no less hard?
Finally Henry came with the clothes so ardently longed after, having run so fast that the sweat poured from his forehead.
Rose had arrived at the same time with henry, so that Felicia now obtained permission from Mrs. Hellwig to return to town. She knew that Aunt Cordelia had a famous salve for burns in her richly stored medicine-chest, and so, while Henry kept guard in the house, she ran up into the attic.
While the Old Ma’m’selle, much shocked, brought forth her cooling salve, and with gentle hand bound up her arm, Felicia related to her the particulars of the accident. She spoke hurriedly, in flowing words. Physical pain and agitation of mind had put her into a state of feverish excitement. So far, the girl’s strong will had gained the victory over her excess of passion; but when Aunt Cordelia quietly remarked that she ought not to have rejected medical aid, the torrent of pent-up feeling burst its bounds at last.
"No, aunt!" cried she, vehemently, " that hand shall never touch me, though it were to rescue me from extremest peril. He has an unspeakable repugnance ‘to the class of people when I am sprung.’ That expression from his lips once grieved my childish heart more than I can tell—I shall never forget it. His duty as a surgeon enabled him, for a moment, to overcome that repugnance which he feels for the ‘pariah.’ I will not accept his sacrifice."
She was silent from exhaustion, and her face was distorted by the pain which her burn was causing.
"He is not destitute of compassion," continued she, after a pause. "I know that he denies himself for the sake of his poor patients. In any other person, such long-continued self-denial, such quiet virtue, would touch me to tears; but here they excite me, as crime would in any one else. I am ungenerous, aunt, ignoble—I feel it; but for the life of me I cannot help being intensely chagrined at having to admire anything in one whom I shall despise forever!"
Once having departed from her usual habit of strict reticence and reserve, she now, for the first time, complained bitterly of the young widow’s heartless treatment.
Again that peculiar red spot was to be seen under the left eye of the Old Ma’m’selle, fugitively, it is true.
"No wonder—she is Paul Hellwig’s daughter!" she remarked.
In these few words, spoken, however, with faint but cutting voice, lay a severe sentence of condemnation. Felicia looked up in surprise, for never had Aunt Cordelia referred to any former relations existing with that branch of the Hellwig family. She had heard with perfect indifference and inattention of the young widow’s arrival, so that Felicia had gathered the impression that she had never had anything to do with her Rhenish relations.
"Mrs. Hellwig pronounces him to be one chosen of the Lord, and the unwearied champion of the holy faith," said the young girl hesitatingly, after a pause. "He must be one of those sternly conscientious men who are gloomy zealots, obeying God’s commands themselves with rigid consistency, but for that very reason judging harshly and uncharitably the failings and weaknesses of others."
A peal of low, bitter laughter fell upon Felicia’s ear. The Old Ma’m’selle had that peculiar style of features concerning which nobody ever asks if they are pretty or ugly. The soul-refreshing language of feminine sweetness and gentleness, combined with a deeply thoughtful mind, mediates here between the rigid requirements of the laws of beauty and the caprices of formative nature—where this line diverges, there the expression makes up for it, but for the same reason these sorts of faces suddenly become entirely strange to us, so soon as this wonted harmony is disturbed. And Cordelia looked positively ugly at this moment—although the laughter in which she indulged was low and subdued, yet it sounded scornful, and her usually quiet, sweet face became quite Medusa-like in its expression of unspeakable bitterness and unutterable contempt. That expression, in conjunction with the singular features of the Old Ma’m’selle, occasionally cast a faint reflex light upon her mysterious past, but not a guiding threat was visible in the dark labyrinth, and even now she did everything to obliterate from her young companion’s mind the impression of her momentary forgetfulness of self-control.
On the large round table in the middle of the room lay several open portfolios. Felicia was very well acquainted with the pamphlets and papers laying scattered around. There, on coarse, yellowish paper, written with pale ink, and often in very queer hieroglyphics shone names, such as Handel, Glueck, Haydn, Mozart—they comprised Aunt Cordelia’s collection of the autographs of distinguished composers. When Felicia entered the room, she had found the old lady ransacking these papers, which locked up for long years in her glass press, without being aired, now emitted a penetrating odor of mold. She now silently resumed her task, while, with the greatest particularity and attention to order, she rearranged and returned them to their places in the portfolio. Gradually the table was cleared, and thereby was brought into view, lying at the very bottom of the whole, a thick manuscript note-book. On the title-page stood these words: "Music for the Operetta—‘The Wisdom of Magistrates in Ordering the Brewing of Beer;’ by Sebastian Bach."
The Old Ma’m’selle significantly laid her finger upon the composer’s name. "You do not know about this, do you?" asked she with a melancholy smile. "It has been lying rolled up in the top drawer of my private secretary for years. This morning many thoughts were revolving in this old brain of mind—all bearing upon the one point, viz., that it is time for me to be putting things in order for my journey home, and if so, that pamphlet in the red portfolio is not to be overlooked. It is probably the only copy in existence; hence, some day, will be worth its weight in gold, my dear Fay. The text, prepared specially for our little town, and written, for the most part, in the dialect of the district hereabout, was mislaid here nearly twenty years ago, and a search after it excited quite a furor in the musical world, on account of its supposed derivation from Bach. This composition, for which search is still being made, is here. The melodies, which have slept here on paper for over a century, are to music what the Niebelungenlied is to poetry, and are so much the more to be prized, as they are the only opera melodies, properly speaking, which Bach ever composed. In the year 1705 the scholars of the country school and some of the citizens performed this operetta over there in the old town-hall."
She turned over the title-page and on the inner side of it was inscribed, in neat hand, the words: "John Sebastian Bach’s score in his own handwriting, received from him as a keepsake in the year 1707. Gotthelf von Hirschsprung." "He must have sung with him there," she continued, with a somewhat tremulous voice, as she pointed to the last nam.
"And how came this pamphlet into your possession, Aunt Cordelia?"
"By inheritance," answered the old lady curtly, in a manner that made the words sound almost rude, as coming from her lips, while she returned the score to its red portfolio.
At such moments it was next to impossible to prolong a conversation which the Old Ma’m’selle desired to break off. In the bearing and gestures of her little drooping form, there lay so decided a refusal to bestow her confidence, that naught could gainsay her will save the most unblushing impudence and curiosity. Felicia cast a longing look at the disappearing manuscript; those melodies which were unknown to any living creature but Aunt Cordelia excited her liveliest interest, but she did not venture to beg for a peep at them, just as awhile ago, she had forborne, in her communication, to allude to the remarkable story of the bracelet—never could she struck twice upon a string that was jarring to the sensibilities of her kind benefactress. The Old Ma’m’selle now opened the piano and Felicia withdrew to the front of the building. The sun was in the act of going down. Over yonder the atmosphere was permeated by whirling, sparkling gold-dust, that blinded the eyes and made heaven and earth blend together shapelessly. As from the hand of the sower separate grains are flung far into the distance, so fell from there rays of crimson and golden light, coloring the tips of the mountain forest-trees and the blooming valleys. Certain parts of the landscape were thereby brought out in new and surprising clearness, like an original thought in some fertile brain. The little village yonder, whose last cottages climbed aspiringly up to the very foot of the mountain, no longer enjoyed a gleam of sunshine; but lightning still flashed from the tall church-spire, and the wide-open house-doors showed hearths, whereon bright fires were glowing, in readiness to prepare the evening meal. Evening seemed to breathe forth a sweet atmosphere of peace upon the outer world, and up here the air was filled with an intoxicating fragrance, poured forth by the many flowers around; not a breeze carried it away, and yet a soft rustling wind might be heard among the sleepy trees, as they rocked their leaves into a slumber. 
Now and then a heavy beetle fell, with buzzing clatter upon the gallery, or a pair of swallows whizzed by, who had just been dismissed from the parent nest—otherwise all was still, solemnly still. With so much the more thrilling effect rang forth the harmonies of Beethoven’s funeral march in the ears of the solitary listener on the balcony, but not many chords had been struck ere Felicia lifted her bowed head in affright, and, full of anxiety, looked back into the room. The piano-playing had ceased. The last strain had died away into a low and spirit-like whisper that nevertheless fell upon the heart of the young girl with the whole force of an irresistible, suddenly apprehended warning. The hands that glided over the keys were weary, weary, even unto death, and those last sweet tones that had responded to their touch were the flappings of the soul’s wings as it prepared to take its final flight from earth.
Chapter XIV
BAPTISM by fire and water had not been without its consequences for the two participants in the ordeal.  The child was seized with a high fever during the night, and Felicia awoke the next morning with a violent headache. In spite of this, however, she performed her ordinary duties with the accustomed punctuality, her burned arm, indeed, hindering her but little, for the excellent salve applied had done its work of healing effectively during the night.
In the afternoon the professor returned home. He had just performed successfully an operation on the eye, which no surgeon had hitherto ventured upon. His step and manner showed the same quiet self-possession by which he was commonly characterized, and from which it did not seem possible to shake him, neither did the healthy glow upon his cheek seem to have been heightened by the slightest shade; and yet one who looked him in the eye could not have failed to be struck by its unwonted brilliancy, as it gleamed forth from beneath the strongly marked brow that overshadowed it. Those cold steel-gray eyes, that seemed to be made for probing and sounding the souls of others, had moments in which they too could emit rays from an inward source of warmth and satisfaction.
He stopped short within the front gate and questioned Fredericka as to her health, that worthy woman having just entered the hall with a bucketful of water.
"I am right well again, thank you, sir," answered she, setting her bucket down, "but that one over yonder," and she pointed to a window in the basement—"I mean that girl Caroline—was mightily upset by the affair of the fire yesterday. I could hardly close my eyes last night for the noise she made talking in her sleep, and today she is going around with a face the color of scarlet, and—"
"You should have told this earlier, Fredericka," interrupted the professor, sternly.
"I did tell the madame but she did not think it anything serious. The girl has never had a doctor called in to her in all her life, and she will come through all right. Weeds are not easy to kill, professor. It does no good at all to be kind to her," added she, apologetically, when she saw how his countenance was darkening; "she has always been a perverse thing from her childhood up, and lived as much apart as though she had been a king’s child instead of a play-actor’s, as is the case. Lord’a’mercy on us! many a time when I baked or broiled something for the madame, I would save a little bit for her—a body must have a little fellow-feeling, you know—and, would you believe it? she never would touch a morsel, and I had to carry it back again every blessed time. You see, sir, that she did when a mere child. Why, in general, she hardly ever eat half enough after my sainted master died, so that the only wonder is how she ever grew up so tall. But all this was pure hard-headedness and sinful pride, because she did not want to have anything given to her—anything by anybody! Why, did I not hear her tell Henry, with my own ears, that if she once turned her back upon this hateful house, she would work her fingers to the bone but that madame should be paid for everything she had given her, down to the smallest scrap of food."
The old cook did not remark that her hearer turned more and more red in the face, while she was thus pouring out to him these accusations. She had hardly finished the last sentence ere he had gone straight to the window designated, without vouchsafing her a single world in reply. It was a large bow window, with stone casement, that was deep set in the ground, and belonged to the chamber in which Fredericka and Felicia slept. The open shutters showed naked whitewashed walls, and wretched furniture—it was, in short, that narrow disagreeable room, in which the little four-year-old Felicia had been called upon to taste the first of that long series of heart-sickening griefs, by which her young heart had been so rent. Now she sat there at the window, the obdurate one, the outcast, who would not eat to satisfaction on the bread of charity, who wanted to work her fingers to the bone in the effort to rid herself of the indebtedness which was hateful to her proud spirit.
Hers was a pride which had kept itself intact, with a fortitude truly masculine, amid the most trying of humiliations; hers was a soul endued with inexhaustible energy; and all this was found in yon youthful creature, who looked child-like in loveliness as she leaned there in unstudied attitude, apparently asleep. Her head was propped up on one arm, that rested on the window-sill, while the snowy whiteness of her skin and the shining luster of her hair were a vivid contrast with the weather-beaten gray stone on which they rested.
Mournfully and yet innocently calm looked the pure profile, with softly closed lips and the corners of the mouth curving downward so sadly—as yet the long dark eyelashes were resting on her pale cheek, and covered the eyes that so often flashed forth anger and indignation. The professor had approached noiselessly, and standing motionless watched her for a minute, after which he stooped down to her.
"Felicia!" came softly and compassionately from his lips.
She started up, and gazed, as it were, incredulously, into the eyes that looked down upon her. Her name pronounced by him touched her with the force of an electric shock. But her figure that had just now been relaxed, in a posture that had all the natural grace pertaining to childhood, became suddenly erect, every muscle drawn to its utmost tension, as though waiting to repel the attack of some hostile power.
The professor completely ignored this change.
"I hear from Fredericka that you are complaining," said he in the commonplace, friendly tone of a physician.
"I feel right well again," answered she, with suppressed feeling. "Rest speedily brings me to."
"Hem! your appearance, however—" he did not complete his sentence, but without ceremony, put in his arm, and made an effort to feel her pulse. She drew a few steps further back into the room.
"Be reasonable, Felicia!" said he, still speaking with kindly gravity, but he frowned darkly, as the girl still stood motionless, while she almost convulsively crossed her arms tightly over her breast. In spite of his thick beard, one could see how angrily he bit his lip.
"Well, I shall no longer address you as a physician, but as your guardian," said he in a hard tone, "and in that capacity I command you to come here without delay."
She did not look up; her eyelashes swept her flushed cheeks yet more persistently than before, while her breast rose and fell in the intensity of the struggle going on within; but nevertheless she came slowly forward, and silently, with averted face, held out to him her hand, which he gently took within his own. That extraordinary small but toil-hardened hand trembled so violently that deep pity was manifest in the workings of the professor’s grave features. 
"Foolish, self-willed child, there again you have forced me to act with severity toward you!" said he, with mild earnestness. "And I had so wished that we might part without any further ill-feeling on either side. Have you then no other look for me or my mother other than that of irreconcilable hatred?"
"One cannot reap other than what he has sown!" returned she, with half-stilted voice. She continually strove to free herself, and her eyes were fastened upon the fingers which still clasped her wrist tenderly but firmly, with as horrified an expression as though they had been of red-hot iron.
Now he let her hand drop quickly. Mildness and compassion vanished from his features, while, with the point of this cane he peevishly struck at some innocent blades of grass that peered up between the flagstones. Felicia breathed more freely: that was the way he ought to be, rough and hard; his compassionate tone tried her sorely.
"Always the same reproach," said he at last, coldly. "Your overweening pride, indeed, may have been wounded often enough; but then it was our special task to lead you back, if possible, to more moderate pretentions. I can stand your hatred to myself quite comfortably, for I only acted for you good; and my mother?—well, her love may be hard to win, I will not dispute that point, but she is too incorruptibly just, and her fear of God would not have allowed her to subject you to actual suffering and injustice. You are about to go out into the world and assume a self-sustaining part, and to succeed you will need pliability more than anything else. In an intercourse with people in general, how are you to get along with your false views, to which you cling so pertinaciously? How will you ever win one heart with those defiant eyes?"
She raised her eyes and looked at him firmly and quietly.
"If it is proven to me that my views are inconsistent with morality and pure reason, I will gladly give them up," replied she, with her deep, expressive voice. "But I know that I am not along in my convictions, that no man, be he whomsoever he will, has a right to sentence another to intellectual death. I know that thousands of others feel with me how unjust and criminal it is to cut off from a human soul the means of ascent to a high level of action, because it dwells in a body that is lowly born. I go forth among them, and confidently hope to find those whom I certainly shall not meet with defiant looks. An unfortunate being like myself, who must live among unfriendly people, has no other weapon than her pride, no other support than the consciousness that she too is a child of God, her spirit being fashioned after the likeness of His spirit. I know that with Him there is no respect of persons, and that the artificial distinctions that exist in society are naught to Him—they are the invention of men, and the meaner and more pusillanimous the soul the more firmly does it adhere to them."
She turned slowly round and disappeared behind the door, which led to the servants’ room, and he stood outside gazing after her; he pulled his hat low upon his forehead, and went into the house. What was revolving in that bowed head none could fathom: but this much was certain, that brilliancy of the eyes which he had brought home with him had flown away; and on the contrary, their light seemed quenched, and his brow furrowed by lines of deep and somber meditation.
In the front hall he found his friend Francke, talking with Henry. The professor looked up quickly, as though waking up, when their voices reached his ear. 
"Well, professor, you have patients in the house, have you not?" asked the lawyer, as he offered him his hand. "The affair of the fire has had disastrous results, I hear. The child—"
"Has a right severe case of catarrhal fever," said the professor, dryly, completing his sentence for him.   He was evidently in no mood for amplifying his communications.
"Ah! professor, that is nothing to signify!" volunteered Henry. "The child is a poor, sickly little creature, and whines all day long any way, but it touches one close when a girl like Fay hangs her head, she whom we never heard complain of a finger-ache before."
"Well, I have not been able to perceive much of that hanging of the head," said the professor, with a strikingly sharp voice—the corners of his mouth might have been seen twitching underneath his beard.    "She holds her head as stiffly as the next one—you may depend upon that, Henry."
He went upstairs with his friend.    On the top step Nannie came to them; she was barefooted and in her night-dress. Fever spots glowed upon the bloated little face, and her eyes were swollen by weeping.
"Mammie is done, Rosa done, and Nannie 'ont water to dyink!" cried she to the professor.    In alarm he picked her up and carried her back to her room in his arms. Nobody was to be seen.    Indignantly he called for her nurse. A distant door opened, and with heated face and smoothing-iron in her hand Rosa came running; there in the room which she had left, on the ironing-board, lay an immense pile of snowy-white mull muslin.
"Where have you been hiding?    How can you leave the child alone this way?" continued he.
"Oh, professor, I cannot divide myself into two parts!" cried the girl, in self-defense, almost crying from vexation. "My mistress was obliged to have a fresh dress right early tomorrow morning, and washing and ironing a muslin dress takes a world of time—if you only knew what a terrible hard task it is." 
She paused for breath, and the lawyer burst into a loud peal of laughter.
"Oh, and that for our lady in the simple white muslin dress!" cried he, for the professor's clouded, embarrassed countenance struck him as excessively comical.
"My lady thought," went on Rosa, taking up the defensive again, " Nannie's fever was a slight one, and that she might very well be left alone for a half hour; she put any number of playthings on the bed by her—
"And where is my cousin?" interrupted the professor roughly.
"She has only gone with Mrs. Hellwig to the meeting of the missionary society."
"That, indeed!" said he, grimly, cutting her short in her recital.    "Now go  and  get  her trumpery ready!" ordered he, pointing to the door whence she had come. Then he called Fredericka, but the old cook had just put her hands into a tray full of dough, and so sent Felicia.
The young girl came upstairs.    A faint flush of inward excitement was still  upon her cheeks,  and yet her eye scanned coolly and gravely the professor's excited countenance.    She stood before him, awaiting his orders, with quiet composure.
It apparently cost him a great effort of self-control to address her at all.
"Little Anna has no one to see after her—will you stay with her until her mother comes back?" asked he finally, and it could not escape an attentive observer that he forced his voice to be friendly in its accents.
"Very gladly," answered she, candidly, "but I have one objection—her mother does not like to see the child and myself together.    If you will take the responsibility upon yourself I am ready."
"Yes, indeed I will."
Without more ado she went into the sleeping-room and closed the door. The lawyer looked after her, with beaming eyes.
"‘Fay,’ Henry calls her strangely," said he to the professor, while he went upstairs to the second story by his side, "and singular as sounds the appellation coming from his coarse lips, it suits her appearance marvelously well, must candidly confess that I cannot imagine how you and your mother ever found courage to place this remarkable girl alongside of your old cook and that saucy piece as their associate."
"Ah—we should have decked her out in silk and satin, you think," cried the professor, excited to a degree that his friend had never seen in him before. "And because a daughter was denied to the house of Hellwig you think that we could not have done better than fill up the empty place with this Fay, or rather Sphinx, as I should say. For your part you always were a dreamer.    But for that matter you are free"—here his tone vibrated from inward excitement—"to make an actor's daughter Mrs. Francke, just as soon as you please—you have my blessing as her guardian."
The fine face of the young lawyer reddened up to the roots of his hair.    For a moment he looked, with concern, through the window, down upon the Market Square (while they talked they had reached the professor's room), then he turned around smiling.
"So far as I can read into this maiden's inmost being, she will hardly trouble you to bestow your blessing as a guardian.    I should therefore be quite satisfied with learning her own decision,'' returned he, not without a slight effort to banter; "and if you think to shock my ears by the designation 'actor's daughter’ you are mightily mistaken, most esteemed professor.    You, indeed, following out your principles, would not admit such a thought without a terrible shaking of the nervous system—to unite an actor's child with quick warm pulse, and the cold blood of the honorable merchants that flows in measured  course through your veins—that would never do—those worthies over yonder would certainly, one and all, turn around in their graves!"
He pointed, through the open door, into the adjoining large room opening upon the balcony.    There, the whole length of the wall, hung a row of excellently painted oil portraits of men, stately, comfortable-looking figures, with sparkling diamonds upon their fingers and on their finely plaited shirt-bosoms.   They were various burgomasters and councilors of commerce, who had once borne the name of Hellwig.
The professor passed into that room—the needle-prick of ridicule did not seem to have touched him.    He crossed his arms over his breast, and walked several times up and down, underneath the pictures.
"You have gone through life stainless," said he, suddenly pausing in his walk.    "If anyone ever supported this outward dignity stainless without inward struggles and battling—I do not believe it.    Human nature has much in it that is perverse, which resists most obstinately where it is hound to obey. All these sacrifices were stones for the erection of a solid building, and that building is the house of Hellwig! Shall they all have been demanded and given, in order that a descendant comes, and with a kick, overturns it as one would a house made of cards? God preserve me from such a fate!"
He looked almost as if, with these words, he had quelled some spiritual foe; for when he returned to his room that singular irritability which Francke had noticed in him with astonishment, had entirely disappeared.
Felicia had probably been installed by the sick bed about a half hour, when the child's mother came home. Her face darkened immediately at sight of the young girl.
"How come you here, Caroline?" asked she, sharply, while she threw her sun-shade on the sofa, and hurriedly stripped off her kid gloves. "I certainly did not ask this service at your hands!"
"But I did!" sternly said the professor, who suddenly stood behind her, on the threshold of the open door. "Your child needed looking after, for she came to meet me on the steps, barefooted."
It is not possible!   Oh, Nannie, how could you be so disobedient?"
"Are you really in doubt, Adele, as to who deserves reproach in this case?" asked the professor, still mastering himself, although the tones of his voice were already threatening.
"Ah, me! I do not know what I shall do about that neglectful creature, that Rosa! She had nothing in the wide world to do but watch over the child; but I know how it is; one has only to turn her back before she is gawking out at the window, or standing before the glass." "It happens that at this minute she is at the ironing-table, in the sweat of her brow, preparing a dress which you are obliged to have tomorrow, at any price," interrupted the professor, emphasizing each word with cutting sarcasm. She was very much frightened. Deadly embarrassment, for the moment, was mirrored upon her face; but she speedily recovered herself.
"Bless me, how silly!" cried she, indignantly frowning; "there, she has gone and misunderstood me again—I frequently have that misfortune."
"Well," he persisted, "we will let this misunderstanding pass; but how could you intrust your child to the care of one whom you have just declared to be so unreliable?"
"John, a sacred duty called me away!" answered the young widow, forcibly, with a dramatic upturning of her beautiful eyes.
"Your duty, as a mother, is the most sacred of all!" cried he—at that moment he was angry. "I did not send you here to busy yourself with missionary work; but wholly and solely for the sake of your child!"
"Good heavens! what would aunt and papa think if they heard you? You used to think differently!"
"I admit that. But thinking for one's self will always I lead us back to this irrevocably firm law of morality—viz., I that we should dedicate our best powers to the ground upon which Providence has placed us—and though you should some day be able to count up hundreds of heathen souls saved through your instrumentality, they would not take away one iota of the reproach which would rest upon you if you suffered your own to perish!"
The lady's face was as red as a peony. She strove to regain self-control and her accustomed softness of manner, and succeeded.
"Do not be so severe upon me, John!" she pleaded.  "Consider that I am but a weak woman, although one with the best intentions. If I have erred it was mainly through love for your dear mother, who wanted my company—but this shall certainly never happen again." The two dove-like eyes that had rested pleadingly and fixedly upon his face, were sparkling, and her face was ashy pale, but her sweetness was valiantly maintained. The young lady took her child's head between her hands, and breathed a kiss upon the little, heated brow.
"I can now resume my place by Nannie, and thank you heartily, dear Caroline, for having taken care of her for me," said she, kindly, to Felicia.
The young girl immediately arose, but the little patient broke out into piteous weeping, and clasped her arm firmly with both of her little hands. The professor felt the child's pulse.
She has a high fever. I cannot permit her, by any means, to be further excited," said he to Felicia, with cold friendliness.    "Will you so far sacrifice yourself as to stay by her until she falls asleep?"
She silently resumed her place, and he went out.   At the same time the disconcerted widow hurried to her sitting-room, and let the door slam behind her. Felicia could hear her moving to and fro with hasty steps. Suddenly a sharp noise sounded through the door, like the tearing of some sort of goods. Nannie got up, as if to listen, and began to tremble; the noise was repeated again and again, each time quicker than before.
"Mamma, Nannie will be pretty; she will not do it again!   Oh, mamma, please do not whip Nannie!" cried the child, as though beside herself.
At that minute Rosa came into the room, the girl's fresh face also looking pale and terrified.
"She is tearing up something again; I heard it in the vestibule," murmured she, glancing across at Felicia with a look of inexpressible contempt. "Hush, precious," whispered she soothingly to the child, "mamma will not do anything to you, she is not coming out, and will soon be all right again."
A door was heard to slam; the angry woman had gone away. Rosa went into the sitting-room, and came directly back, with a bundle of white pieces in her hand; they were the remains of what had been a cambric pocket-handkerchief.
"When she gets into a passion she does not know what she is doing," whispered the girl. "She pulls to pieces whatever happens to be at hand, and strikes without mercy, too, as that poor little creature there knows right well."
Felicia pressed the child to her breast, as though she would protect her from one of her mother's passionate outbursts. Her solicitude, however, was groundless. The voice of the same lady was suddenly heard from the entry in silvery tones of sweetness; she was talking merrily with Mr. Francke, who was just now coming down-stairs, and when she reappeared in the sick-room soon afterward her exterior was lovelier and more graceful than ever. The flush of anger had only heightened the bloom of her softly rounded cheeks, and no one would have dreamed that the striking brilliancy of her eyes betokened aught but the exalted emotions of a noble woman's soul!
CHAPTER XV.
Then Felicia took her seat, by the professor's desire, at Anna's bedside. She had little thought that she was entering upon a long service, as nurse. The child grew dangerously ill, and would not suffer either her mother or Rosa to come near her, while with the professor and Felicia she was docile and quiet. In her feverish dreams the cambric handkerchief played a great part. The professor listened with surprise to the child's exclamations of fear and distress, causing her mother's cheeks to flush more than once from the alarm and embarrassment caused by his searching looks and questions. Supported by Rosa, she always maintained that Anna must have had a bad dream that had no counterpart in reality.
Felicia soon found herself quite at home in her character as nurse, although her task was very irksome in the beginning by the necessity of hourly intercourse with the professor; but anxiety for the child's life, which he shared with her, helped her over the disagreeableness of her situation much better than she would have supposed. She was surprised at herself for understanding him so well in his character as a doctor, while, to the rest, including the child's mother, he seemed impenetrable. She always divined immediately, whether the symptoms were alarming or the reverse. Therefore hardly a word was needed for making her comprehend the needs of the moment. He alternate with her in the night watches, but during the day, too, h was a great deal in the sick-room. For hours he would sit patiently by her little cot, laying first one hand and the: the other upon the child's forehead. There must have laid some strangely soothing virtue in the touch of those hands for at such times she was motionless and rested quietly.
Indignantly the young girl tried to shake off the thought which stole upon her with regard to the very different manner in which he had treated her, while, sitting at no great distance, she silently observed him. Those were the same irregular, strongly marked features; the same heavy, protruding forehead, above which the thick hair was brushed with painful exactness. The voice and eyes were the same which had been the horror of her childhood; but for that look of gloomy asceticism which had once made his youthful head appear so unyouthful and repulsive she sought in vain.    A mild light, as it were, emanated from that thoughtful brow, and when she heard how soothingly he addressed the excited child with a voice that was inexpressibly soft, she could not conceal from herself the fact that he comprehended the full sanctity of his calling.
Not with a heartless shrug of the shoulders did he witness the sufferings of others, and it was not only for the bodies of his patients that he cared, their fainting spirits also found in him a prop, for they read, sympathy in his eyes, and drank courage and consolation from his voice. He had language at his command to a degree that seldom falls to the lot of man.    He made use of tones and words that affected the young girl's heart with all the force of an electric shock.    At such moments who could have been mindful of his awkward, angular movements, and reserved manners in social intercourse?    He was then a morally beautiful apparition, a man endued with great moral beneficence,  the restlessly thoughtful and persistent mediator between the two imbittered opponents   "Life and Death." But with however softening an influence these thoughts occurred to her, her concluding reflection was ever the same. He has humane feelings pitying the helpless condition of his meanest neighbor; hence, "the outlawed actor's child has double reason for despising him, for he has ever been toward her a pitiless oppressor, a prejudiced and unjust judge."
During their present daily intercourse he had not a single time struck upon that tender key which was dreadful to her, and against which she continually struggled with the weapons of pride and determined opposition. He stuck to that cold tone of civility, which he had invariably assumed toward her since that last conversation, and this too consisted rather in the expression of his countenance than in his words, for, with the exception of questions which were indispensable, he hardly ever spoke to her. The stand he had to take toward the child's mother was a difficult one. She behaved, at first, like a madwoman, and would not by any means hear of Felicia's taking the place of herself and Rosa by the bedside; so that it required all his determination to bring her into measures. As it was, she could not be prevented from perpetually thrusting in at the door a curly head, that seemed a regular bugbear to the nervous child.    It may be observed that these intrusions always occurred when her cousin and Felicia happened to be together in the sick-room.    She wept and wrung her white hands— there is no human face that can remain beautiful under a gush of tears, caused by genuinely strong and painful emotion, let poets, as they will, haunt their heroines as "fascinating in their tears;" but here on this rosy oval not a line was deepened, not the tiniest distortion of feature shone, not a single red spot disfigured the delicate complexion, and the tears rolled softly down the smoothly rounded cheeks; her weeping was as perfectly artistic as though she had been a painter’s ideal of a mater dolorosa. What a difference between hers and the pale, anxious face of the girl who sat by the child's bedside.    Every evening regularly she appeared in an elegant wrapper; a beautifully fine little lace cap set off her charming face, and her taper fingers clasped a prayer-book—she wanted to sit up.     The self-same dispute  arose every time between her and the professor, she protesting, in one set phrase, against such an usurpation of her motherly rights, and then retiring with tears and lamentations, in order to rise the next morning as fresh as a summer rose.
The ninth evening of Anna's sickness had come.    The child lay in a dull stupor, only now and then an inarticulate moan escaping from her lips.    The professor had been sitting for a long while by her little bed, pressing her forehead between his encircling hands; all upon a sudden he stood up and beckoned Felicia into the adjoining room.
"You sat up last night, as well as the night before, without having a moment's rest allowed you today, and yet I have a further sacrifice to ask of you," said he. "Tonight the crisis will occur. To be sure, I could now admit my cousin and Rosa, for the child is unconscious; but I need assured devotion and presence of mind at my side— will you sit up this one more night?"
"Yes."
"Yet, hours of anxiety and excitement are before you— do you feel strong enough to encounter them?"
"Oh, yes—I love the child, and, in short—I will."
"Have you such firm faith in the strength of your will?* His voice was already softening into tenderness.
"It has never failed me yet," replied she, her look, which up to this time had been perfectly composed, forthwith becoming cold and distant.
Night approached—a sweet, calm night in spring! The shimmering light of a full moon hovered over the sleeping city; in the balcony chamber of the old Hellwig mansion it tinged with silvery radiance the silent portraits on the walls, and breathed upon their spell-bound forms a strange semblance to life; the flowers on the carpet were beautified by its pale luster, and from the crystal chandeliers, hanging from the ceiling, flashed millions of silvery sparks.
But inside, within that darkened sick-chamber, a dreadful power circled above that narrow bed; the circle grew narrower, and sunk lower and lower upon the quivering little body stretched there, for the child had been seized with the most frightful convulsions. The professor was sitting by the bed; his eye resting fixedly upon the convulsed limbs, and the little face which was distorted until it was no longer recognizable. He had done everything that lay within the province of medical skill and human science, and now he must wait in powerless inactivity, and leave the powers of nature to maintain the struggle alone.
Outside it struck twelve in tones long drawn out. Felicia sat, in silence, at the foot of the bed, wrapped in her own reflections; it seemed to her as though one of those mighty vibrations must bear the child's soul along with it—and indeed the violently working limbs did suddenly relax, the little clinched hands opened, and fell feebly upon the coverlet, and a few seconds after the little head, too, lay motionless on its pillow. The professor had bent low over the bed; ten minutes of anxious suspense elapsed, after which he raised his head and whispered with emotion, "I regard her as safe now."
The young girl leaned inquiringly over the patient, and was relieved by hearing her breathe deeply and quietly, and seeing her stretch out her poor, weary little limbs as though, at last, they were at rest. Noiselessly she arose and went out into the adjoining room. She stepped into a recess of one of the windows which was wide open. The spicy breeze in which already mingled the harshness of coming dawn, swept refreshingly over her, as she leaned her weary head on the stone window casement, while her folded bauds sunk down limp at her sides. On the sill stood a potted tea-rose; it had one single but magnificent bloom upon it, which, looking doubly white in the bright moonlight, hung caressingly over the pale brow and glistening hair of the maiden. Felicia's pulses throbbed feverishly—no wonder, for there, in that dark, close room, death had been waging a fierce battle with life over the possession of a human being, and the tension upon her nerves during those last hours had been frightful; no other sound than the occasionally shrill outcries of the child had broken upon her ear; she had seen nothing but the convulsed limbs of the sick child and the pale, still face of the physician, who only appealed to her for help by means of nods and glances—four narrow walls inclosed him and herself alone; they moved harmoniously together in the exercise of neighborly duty and compassion, while the deep chasm of hatred and prejudice yawned between them.
The dry, burning eyes of the young girl gazed through the window lying opposite at the moonlit front of the tower hall. The statues on both sides of the clock, a Madonna and St. Boniface, like ghostly guardians emerged from their niches—alas! poor protectors had they been for averting one tragedy at least. The accident that had doomed her to life-long misery had occurred almost under their very eyes. Those three high windows there, now glittering like silver, on that unlucky evening had reflected the rose tinted lights of a fairy-like illumination, and just there where the moonbeams were so harmlessly sporting on the floor, had stood that marvelously beautiful woman, unawed by the size of the audience and the bristling array of musketry which was to threaten her life's blood. But under that gaudy helmet had beat a mother's heart. Meanwhile the child for whom she made such sacrifices was slumbering in solitude in the house of a stranger, little recking of the irreparable loss she was so soon to sustain.
The professor came out of the sick-room, and closed the door noiselessly behind him. He went up to Felicia, who still stood motionless at the window.
"Nannie is sweetly asleep," said he. "I shall stay by her the remainder of the night myself; you, too, must take some rest now."
Felicia immediately left her place at the window, without waiting for the end of his speech, and passed him silently on her way out of the room.
"I do not think we ought to part so distantly tonight," he called after her in a subdued voice, making it seem as if, almost against his will, he was breaking the spell of silence which had heretofore held them both.     "We have stood by each other like good comrades these last days, working together unitedly in our efforts to save the life of a fellow-creature—and consider!''' added he, warmly, "in a few weeks we shall separate, in all likelihood never to meet again.    I shall not deny you the satisfaction of hearing me admit that, by the force of your own character, you have overcome a great deal of the prejudice and ill opinion that I had conceived of you during the past nine years.    In only one respect, viz., your obstinate perseverance in hatred, do I find unchanged the unmanageable child who once brought out all the hardness and severity of which I am capable."
Felicia had drawn a few steps nearer. The moonshine irradiated her whole figure. As she stood there, her head proudly poised—as she looked back at him from over her shoulder, while her face looked paler than before, and her lips were tightly compressed—there was something inexorably hostile in the whole apparition.
"In diseases of the body, you first inquire into the causes of a malady, before you judge of the remedy to apply," answered she. "But whence proceeded that so-called unmanageableness of disposition which you wanted to improve, you did not deem it needful to examine. Take away from a man his ideal, all that he has dreamed of as delightful in the future, though he be the most pious and virtuous person in the world, surely he could not, just at the first minute, fold his hands in resignation; but how much less a child, only nine years old, who has had her eye unceasingly directed toward the day which was to restore to her an idolized mother; through whose soul not a dream of hope had passed, unconnected with this expected meeting!"
She paused, but not a word came from the professor's lips, nor had his eye once turned toward her. When she had begun her defense of herself, he had stretched out his arm quickly and impetuously, as though he would interrupt her; but the further she proceeded the more motionless he became, and the more attentively he listened. He had not even a single time stroked his beard with his hand, a gesture habitual with him whenever he played the part of listener.
"Uncle kept me in that blissful state of unconsciousness," continued she, after a pause, "but he died, and with him, pity in this household. That morning I had visited my mother's grave for the first time, just the evening before having learned of her horrible fate—at the same time, they had told me, that the actor's wife was a lost creature, whom the all-merciful God would not admit into His heaven—"
"Why did you not tell me all this at the time?" interrupted the professor in hollow tones.
Felicia had spoken with suppressed voice, out of consideration for the sick sleeper in the adjoining room, a circumstance which only intensified the bitterness of feeling conveyed by her words. She now continued to speak in the same tone, while she turned her beautiful face toward her adversary, and laughed derisively.
"Why did I not tell you then?" repeated she.    "Because you had just a little while before declared that you had an inexpressible repugnance for the class of people from which I sprung, and that there must be a taint in my blood."    The professor for a moment put his hand over his eyes.    "Young as I was, and although I had just experienced my first great sorrow, I learned at precisely the same time that I was to meet with no pity, no sympathy And have you ever had one particle of pity or sympathy for the actor's child?" asked she, quickly taking one step nearer him, and emphasizing each word with peculiar bitterness.    "Has it ever occurred to you that the creature could have thought whom you wished to confine solely to the treadmill of labor?   Have you not inflicted untold torture upon her spirit, while you endeavored to stifle within her every upward aspiration, every expression of moral self-dependence, every impulse of the wild vine to engraft itself upon something nobler?    Do not believe that I am calling you to account for having brought me up to work —work, though it be the severest and hardest work, disgraces no one—I love to work; but that you should try to degrade me into a slavish mechanical tool, and complete annihilate the intellectual part of my nature, that is what I shall never forget in you."
"Never, Felicia?"
The young girl shook her head energetically, with a gesture that was well-nigh frantic.
"I suppose, then, I must e'en yield me to my fate," said he, with a faint smile, that shaped itself in most remarkably melancholy fashion, although apparently sorely against his will.    '' I have mortally offended you, and yet—I repeat it—I could  not, dared  not,   act differently."     He walked up and down the room several times.    "I must, once more, touch a tender spot in your nature, in attempting to defend my motives,'' continued he, quickly.    "You are entirely portionless and of infamous extraction, therefore destined to earn your own livelihood.    If I had given your education a higher direction, it would have been cruel to thrust you back into servitude, and yet I could not have done otherwise; or do you believe that any reputable family would commit the education of its children to the daughter of an actor?    Do you not know that a man"—here he paused for a moment, drawing a deep breath, while an ashy pallor covered his face—"yes, a man of the higher circles, who should perchance link his fate with yours, would have to make great sacrifices, both external and internal?    What a never-ceasing humiliation for your proud heart!    Such are the social laws which you despise, but which the majority of mankind maintain intact, though often with unspeakable anguish and self-sacrifice, out of reverence for the past, and regard to the political necessities of the present. I, too, must submit to them—inward sufferings are not always stamped upon a person's forehead—those laws claim self-denial on my part and a solitary walk through life."
He was silent. Felicia was strangely thrilled by being permitted, here, at the solemn midnight hour, to look into the secret of this reserved man's heart, which was divulged in shy haste, almost in spite of himself, and with quivering lips. He was in love, doubtless, with some lady who was far above him in social position. Standing to him, as she did, in a positively hostile relation, there now crept over her such a feeling of nameless woe as had been utterly unknown to her before. Was it probable that she could feel compassion for him? Had she, after all, so unpardonably weak a character—she, who had recently declared so positively, "If misfortune overtakes him, I shall never be sorry for him?" And, finally, he was not to be pitied at all.
Why did he quietly resign himself to his fate, instead of wrestling for the high prize with manly determination?
"Well, Felicia, have you no reply to make?" asked he; "or do you rather feel aggrieved by an explanation which I could not, however, avoid?"
"No," returned she coldly. "That is your own peculiar view—nothing lies further from my wishes than to see it altered. You will not be able, however, to deprive me of my faith, viz., that there are brave, unprejudiced men, who can recognize truth and honor, even though met with in an actor's daughter. Why should I answer you? Our argument would never come to an end. You occupy the position of the gentlefolk, so-called, who bind themselves with fetters lest they fall in spite of themselves, while I belong to a class of persons who are misjudged by your caste, because they presume to think for themselves. You, yourself, say that we shall soon part, never to meet again; but we are yet wider apart in spirit. Have you any further orders to give with reference to the patient?"
He shook his head, and ere he could say another word, she had left the room.
CHAPTER XVI.
LITTLE ANNA'S recovery progressed rapidly; although, as yet, Felicia had not been relieved of her duties as sick-nurse. The little creature, otherwise a patient, quiet child, became violent and excitable so soon as the young girl left her chamber; so that nothing was left for Anna's mother to do but to beg Felicia to stay with the child until she was perfectly restored to health.
The young widow did this with so much the lighter heart, inasmuch as the professor no longer frequented the sick-room. He came every morning to see his little patient, but those visits hardly lasted three minutes. Many a time he would take the child in his arms, and carry her to and fro several times in the sunny, well-protected front yard—otherwise he was seldom seen in the house. It was as though he had been suddenly seized with a passion for out-door life; his distribution of time had become entirely a different one from what it had been previously, and now lie hardly worked at all in his own room of a morning—whoever wanted to speak with him was invited out into the garden. Mrs. Hellwig adapted herself with singular equanimity to this whim of her son's., as she styled it, and to the infinite satisfaction of her niece, arranged so as to have the principal meal of the day served in the summer-louse as a general thing. The old mansion thereby became quieter than ever, for often the family did not return home ill nearly ten o'clock at night. It frequently happened, however, that the professor would come back earlier and alone. Then Felicia would hear him slowly come upstairs, md then there was another peculiar way that he had, viz., le would regularly go up a few steps toward the sick-room, is though mechanically, then suddenly stand still in the middle of the entry, as though he bethought himself, and afterward go on quicker than 'before, till he reached the second story. His chamber was just over the sick-room— on such evenings he did not sit over his books—for hours le would restlessly pace up and down. This solitary promenading had always something about it that peculiarly irrigated Felicia—it struck her as harmonizing with his mid-light confession.
About eight o'clock in the evening Anna usually fell asleep; when Rosa would take Felicia's place by the child's bedside, and then came hours of refreshment for the young girl—for then she repaired to the attic. Aunt Cordelia seemed to have happily recovered from her recent attack of faintness that so nearly resembled death; she was more cheerful than ever, and could be as merry as a child in talking over the happiness that was so soon coming, when she and Felicia would be together all the time. She generally waited supper for her young companion. Then the neatly arranged tea-table would be set in the front room. Something to suit Felicia's taste, particularly, was always provided, and, moreover, a pile of fresh periodicals was ever at hand to tempt her to read aloud. In these briefly meted out hours of enjoyment, all that had lately tormented and oppressed Felicia's heart—greatly to her own surprise—sunk away into oblivion. She never spoke of her own affairs in the front part of the house; the Old Ma'm'selle, true to her custom, did not at all encourage her to be communicative, and so, Felicia's inward struggles, problematical as they were to herself, naturally fell into the background and seemed to have been merely transitory.
One beautiful, sunny afternoon, Felicia sat alone by Anna's side; a church-yard silence prevailed all over the house. Mrs. Hellwig and her niece had gone visiting, and the professor was almost certainly in the garden; for, not a sound was to be heard from the second floor. The little girl had been playing for a long while, but now threw herself back weariedly, and said imploringly: "Sing me a song, Caroline!"
The child was passionately fond of hearing Felicia sing. That young girl had an alto voice, which rang out with the deep full sound of "a sweet-toned bell," escaping from the breast without the least apparent effort; its richness reminded one of the violincello, and its tone, that without any tangible, sharp edge, floated out into the air, bore with it a breath of tender melancholy, such as expressed an unfathomable depth of thought. The Old Ma'm'selle, with her rare musical knowledge and enlarged culture, who had had her own training from the most skillful masters, had admirably disciplined this rarely beautiful voice, so that Felicia sung German songs in a truly classical manner. She had found that she could always soothe the child into quietness by chanting some sustained melody in low tones; afterward she would let out her voice more strongly, never, of course, though, when she knew that unfriendly ears were near.
"Thou tender green, thou fresh young grace," that deeply thoughtful song of Schumann's, now rang through the sick-room with such an expression as could only have been given it by the lips of a chaste young virgin: but as she began these words—
"What drives me far from men away? A grief no mortal tongue can sway "—
her voice swelled into organ-like fullness. At this moment, up in the professor's room, a chair was hurled away rather than pushed back, quick steps were heard crossing the floor, and portentously, as though a storm were impending, a bell rang, as violently swayed to and fro in the hand of a strong man. It was the first time that any use had been made of the bell that stood upon the study-table, and so Fredericka went hurrying up two flights of stairs, and Felicia suddenly became as mute as a mouse. In a few minutes the old cook came blustering down-stairs again, and into the sick-chamber.
"The professor bade me tell you not to sing any more— he could not work for it," reported she in her rough, unfeeling manner. ''He was as white as chalk, and could hardly speak for rage. What in the world makes you do such silly things? I never heard anybody like you in all my life; you sing exactly like a man, and, Heaven forbid! such a song! Why, it was a regular patrol song! I do not know what sort of a girl you are! I used to sing myself, to be sure, when I was young—but then such sweet pretty ditties as were in fashion then, like 'Merry, merry, merry be,' and 'Rise, gentle moon!' Never do anything of the kind again, Caroline, you mind that! Yes, and you are to carry the child down into the yard, and walk her about some; the professor said so."
Felicia hid her glowing face in her hands, for it seemed as though, morally, a heavy blow had been inflicted upon her. How much ashamed she felt at this moment, how deeply humbled! Courageous as she could be when the question was to defend her convictions of right, and tell her enemies the truth to their faces, where her talents and acquirements were concerned she was proportionately shy and self-distrustful. It cut her to the heart to know that her voice had penetrated to the ears of outsiders, but to have caused grave annoyance was what she had never dreamed of and almost more than she could bear. And yet this had actually happened, and she had laid herself open to the suspicion of having tried to attract attention to her accomplishment, and therefore she had been reproved and punished in this shameful way; it was not to be endured! The grossest acts of injustice and maltreatment on the part of Mrs. Hellwig had never been able to extort from her a tear, but now she wept bitterly.
A quarter of an hour afterward Felicia was slowly and carefully rolling the child's carriage up and down, through the middle of the court-yard. The feverish spots upon her cheeks gradually paled under the refreshing influences of the open air; but they had not been able to dispel the gloom that still overshadowed her pale brow. It was not long before Mrs. Hellwig appeared in company with her niece, and, at the same time, the professor came down-stairs, evidently with the design of going out, for he held hat and cane in hand. All three entered the court-yard. The young widow carried a large bundle, and after kissing and fondling her child, she pushed back a little of the paper in which the parcel was wrapped, and looked across at her cousin, with a charmingly roguish air.
"Just look here, John, am I not a right extravagant woman?" asked she, sportively. "Steeled as my heart is against the love of dress, it cannot resist the fascinations of a bargain in house-linen. I happened to see this exquisite table-cloth in a shop, and would you believe it, I could not let it slip? No, not possibly! Before I knew what I was about, I had the table-cloth in my arms, and this roll of toweling, into the bargain. Farewell now my hopes of a handsome winter suit. To be conscientious, I must fill up this hole in my purse by denying myself many an article of dress this winter—well, never mind—a true German housewife can never get her clothes-press full enough."
The professor did not answer. He looked over the head of the speaker, in the direction of the yard-gate. There was just now entering it the plain woman whom Felicia had recently seen in the study on the second floor. She seemed to be heavily laden with something that she was carrying under a great cloak that she had wrapped around her, and advanced toward the professor with an almost reverential air.
"Professor, my William has his sight again. He can see now as well as me or anybody else," said she, her voice trembling and a stream of tears gushing from her eyes. "Who would have thought it! How wretched a man he was and all the rest of us with him. Now he can work for his living again and I shall die easy when my time comes, for I shall not leave behind me a blind and helpless child. Ah sir! all the treasures in the world would not be too much for you! But you see, we are so utterly poor that we can never hope to pay you a tenth part of what we owe. Do not be angry, though, my dear sir, for I could not help offering you at least a trifle—"
"Well, and what is it to be?" interposed the professor sharply, retreating a step.
As she had spoken her last words, the woman threw back her cloak, revealing a large bird-cage and a roll of linen toweling.
"You were so fond of hearing the nightingale sing when you were at our house," she went on again; "and if you were to put the little creature in a small cage it would go to Bonn with you right nicely. And this piece of linen— it is not fine, but strong, for I spun and wove it myself—if Mrs. Hellwig happened to need towels—"
"Are you not a little demented, good woman, to be taking your husband's bird away from him?" continued the professor ferociously—he frowned until his eyes could hardly be seen beneath their overhanging brows. "I cannot bear birds—positively dislike them—and do you think you are called upon to furnish us with clothes! Pack up your things directly, and make haste home with them." The woman stood in speechless embarrassment before him.
He offered her his hand, and again threw her cloak over the things which had caused this ill-fated expedition. The disappointed petitioner courtesied with downcast eyes, and withdrew. Mrs. Hellwig and her niece had been silent spectators of the scene; the face of the former, however, expressed decided ill-humor, and, at one time, it had even seemed as if she were about to have her voice in the transaction.
"I must say, John, I do not exactly understand you," she said, in a fault-finding tone, after the woman had left. "When I reflect upon the great expense of your education, it would really seem to me as if you ought not to reject any fee whatever—her idea about the bird was ridiculous, its chattering would be distracting in my quiet house—but the woman should have left the linen here, if I had had any say in it—nobody throws linen out of the window, with my consent, be it meant for you or me."
"Ah, auntie, I am afraid then you would not have seconded me in the benevolent thoughts that came into my mind awhile ago," said the young widow, playfully. "Only think, John," she continued, becoming graver and softly turning her eyes up, "this morning we have heard of an unfortunate but honest family; the poor children have no under-clothes at all. I was so sorry for them! Auntie and I have thought about getting up a collection for them already. If you had accepted that linen, I would have come to you as a beggar, without loss of time. Whether or no, you should have given it to me, for what splendid shirts they would have made for those children! I would have done the sewing myself—" 
"Oh, as to such thoughtful Christian compassion!" interrupted the professor with a mocking laugh.    "The last thread must be taken from one poor family, in order to supply the necessities of another; and the magnanimous contriver of this labor of love comes and shows herself to the world of the afflicted, with her fair head encircled by a halo of womanly benevolence!"
" You are satirical, John!" cried the mortified lady. "I love to give—"
"'Provided that it costs me nothing;’ is not that it, Adele?" said he, finishing her sentence for her in bitter irony. "Else, why does not the true German housewife draw upon her own full press? Here is this perfectly superfluous piece, for example—" and he caught at the roll of linen on her arm.    Both ladies warded off his hand in horror, as though an attempt had been made upon the very life of the young widow.
"No, that were asking too much indeed, John!" wailed she; "not such beautiful linen as this."
The professor now turned to his mother, paying no further heed to his cousin's injured air, and said, "You just now accused me of not reaping as I should do the just fruits of my expensive education. I can assure you that I am practical, however, and deem it a man's duty to earn all that he can; but, at the same time, I have other and higher views with regard to my calling; more than any other profession—the clerical not excepted—it leads into the broad domain of human charity. I shall never be one of those physicians, who, with one hand raise up a sick man from his couch of pain, in order to plunge him, on the other side, into difficulties caused by the necessity of paying for this help."
"It is your own affair, John; so far as I am concerned, you can act as you choose,'' said Mrs. Hellwig, frigidly. "You would not, however, have dared express such sentiments to your grandfather. The practice of medicine is your business, and 'in business,' he used to say 'no sentimental fits can be indulged in.’''
She dragged her clumsy form ill-humoredly along in the direction of the hall-door. Her niece pressed her bundle to her bosom, with a gesture of endearment, and followed her, walking alongside of the professor. In the entrance-hall, the latter turned his head once more in the direction of the yard. Felicia was just lifting little Anna out of her carriage, in order to gratify a wish that she had expressed several times, to be carried up and down in her arms for awhile. One would have thought that the slight, delicate frame would have been crushed at this minute, when the child, flinging her arms about the young girl's slender neck, threw her whole weight upon her. The professor straightway returned to the yard.
"I have already, several times, prohibited you from lifting that child; she is too heavy for you. Did not Fredericka tell you that Henry must help you?"
"She forgot that; Henry is not at home either."
The professor took the child away from her, and replaced it in its carriage, at the same time gravely addressing himself to it. The expression of his face was sterner and darker than ever. At any other time, Felicia would have turned her back upon him defiantly, but today she was to blame for his ill-humor. She had interrupted the studies of the man of science by her singing, and possibly scared away some new idea just shaping itself into being. It made no matter; let him be ever so angry and provoked, she must rid herself, at any cost, of the burden which was oppressing her soul; he must learn that she had offended ignorantly. The moment was favorable to her, inasmuch as her adversary need not look up, for he was still stooping over the carriage, talking with Anna.
"I want to beg your pardon for having annoyed you with my singing," said she timidly.
This sweetly pleading tone in her voice was so entirely new to him that it exercised a wondrous effect; he started and cast a penetrating glance upon the girl's face.
"If you would only believe," continued she urgently, "that I had not the remotest suspicion of your being in the house!"
The word "singing" aroused in Anna the recollection of Felicia's tears. "Bad uncle! You made Caroline cry!" she chided, threatening him with her little clinched fist.
"Is the child right, Felicia?" asked he quickly. She avoided answering this question directly. "I was very unhappy in the thought—"
"That it might be believed that you wanted to be heard?" said he, interrupting her, while a fugitive smile played upon his face, "You may rest easy as to that. Revengeful and unforgiving as I deem you, the thought of your seeking admiration never entered my mind—I could not accuse you of that, even if I wished to. I had them ask you to stop: not exactly that you disturbed me, but because I cannot stand hearing your voice. Now does that mortify you beyond measure?"
Felicia smiled and shook her head.
"Well, that is reasonable. For the rest, I will tell you something." He bent his head low and looked deeply and searchingly into her eyes. "Your singing today has betrayed to me a well-kept secret."
Felicia looked terrified. Could he have got upon the track of her intercourse with Aunt Cordelia? She felt her color come, and looked at him in anxious bewilderment.
"I know now why you have forbidden all thoughts of further intercourse with us in the future. To that sphere in which you will hereafter live and act, our arm does not indeed reach. You are going upon the stage."
"There you are mistaken!" answered she decidedly and evidently relieved. ''Although I regard it as one of the most glorious of gifts, to be able to put into action before one's fellow-men the creations of great geniuses. Yet, for this, I am totally lacking in courage. I am a perfect coward where the public is concerned, and would certainly never rise above mediocrity in my representations, were it from no other cause than my lack of self-confidence. Furthermore, a thorough knowledge of music is required for this calling, and I shall never possess that.''
"It may be wholly within your reach."
"Just on that very account. As a child, I fancied that music was a thing that could not at all be learned as one learns to read and write—a something that, like the religion of Jesus, must come direct from heaven, and this childish fancy I cleave to. That what can move me to tears and inspire me beyond many other glorious things in this world, should rest upon rigid pedantic laws, and stand upon paper in the form of a crowd of ugly little black marks with round heads, and be counted mathematically! Why the very thoughts deprive me of all pleasure in it; it affects me as painfully as the fact that the bones of a beautiful human countenance form a death's-head. I purposely avoid a look at the troublesome machinery."
"There again we have the key-tone to your nature, that revolts against everything like law and regulation," said he, sarcastically; although he had followed with risible interest her peculiar definition of music. ''So, my conclusion was false, and your striking sorrow just now superfluous," added he, after a pause. "That must be a remarkable secret! I could almost wish, finally, to press for an exposition of your plan of life, in virtue of my office as guardian."
"It would be in vain," answered she, calmly and decidedly. "I do not mean to speak. You have yourself given me leave, after the lapse of two months, to act as I choose."
''Yes, yes, the mistake, alas! has been made," answered he, with irritation. "But for all that, I find it—to speak mildly—rash in one of your still youthful years, to want to decide upon a course of life, entirely to suit herself, without asking counsel or aid from some wise friend —as I put the case; it concerns the most important step that a woman can take in life-—a tie that would bind her forever—"
"In such a case, my guardian would be the very last person to whom I would go for advice," interrupted Felicia, with crimson cheeks. "I would have been bound already, and that, too, to one of the meanest and most despicable of men, if I had not had the ' rashness ' to take it upon myself to decide upon questions affecting my own life. You would have accepted unconditionally the so-called honorable offer from Wellner, if I had been weak enough to allow myself to be intimidated by a course of ill-treatment and threats."
This reproach cut like a two-edged sword, for it was just. The professor bit his lips—for a moment his eye glanced unsteadily to the flag-stones at his feet.
"I did indeed think that this might best be brought to a close, the guardianship committed to me by my father," said he, after a painful pause—his voice was far from possessing its usual firmness. "It was an error; but one not at all obstinately persisted in, as you know. Although I gave my consent, in accordance with my mother's advice, and upon her representation, without a personal investigation of the case myself, yet I was far from desiring to influence your decision by persuasion or severity of any kind. As for the rest, my words awhile ago will have been my last attempt to use my rights as a guardian," continued he, not without bitterness.    "I must leave you to your fate. You go to meet it gladly and hopefully, do you not?"
"Yes!" answered the young girl, with beaming eyes. "And you expect to be happy in your new relations?"
"Just as certainly as I believe in a happier world beyond the tomb!"
As he asked this last question he gave her one of those searching glances which he was wont to turn upon his most obdurate patients; but when he saw her face become more and more radiant, he turned away his head, as though hurt or vexed, and spoke not another word.    Absent-mindedly he held out his hand to little Anna, touched his hat lightly, land slowly went back into the house.
On the evening of the same day Rosa sat in the servants' room, with a pile of some soft light blue woolen material heaped up in her lap, while her fingers plied the needle with almost feverish rapidity.    Fredericka was keeping her company.    The waiting-maid found herself necessitated to work until after midnight, which had put into the old cook's head the excellent idea of boiling a pot of strong coffee, "just to keep their spirits up."
It had struck ten long ago.    Felicia had gone into her bedroom to get some rest, but the incessant chattering of the coffee-drinkers, who were sitting close by, made her stay in that damp sultry room well-nigh intolerable. She opened the window wide, seated herself on its sill, with her hands clasped around her knees, and looked out into the yard. It was not quite dark. Astral lamps were still burning in the entries of the first and second stories. Through the lofty windows long columns of light fell upon the stone pavements; they silvered the spray of the splashing fountain, and made to glow certain dark glass panes in gloomy corners, and finally cast a pale reflection upon the tolerably remote facade of the house in the rear. But a starry sky arched above that great square of buildings. Unchanged from what they had been long ages ago, its constellations looked into that court-yard, which tradition peopled with actors in many a tragic drama. They had seen in the bloom of life those who now haunt the place as awful specters, wringing their hands in sign of agony untold; noble knights and honorable merchants; ladies of rank in silken trains, and the notable housewife, bustling about in substantial linen; in turn, they had been gazed upon by eyes glowing with the love of this world's pleasures; also by some, who, inflated with self-love, had but cold and unsympathetic glances to bestow upon the sublime works of God's creation, lurking eyes that strove ill to conceal a capability of crime., and child-eyes swimming in tears, and looking, ah! so wistful! Their light had been extinguished —they had all moldered into dust; but nature's great lesson, that everything must pass away, has not yet been taken to heart. Generation after generation have opened their eyes and closed them again, and all that lay between those two moments, that struggling and striving for titles and dignities, wealth and luxury in dress, had found its goal in a bit of earth. And a striking feature in human character had also been manifested here—viz., the love of power—that unholy impulse to exalt one's self and put one's foot upon his neighbor's neck; and where outward consequence and mental ability had not sufficed to effect this, there had been recourse to an illusory cloak of faith. Nothing has been more distorted or pillaged from in the interests of worldliness than the Word of God; never has more daring sin been committed than in the name of God.
While these thoughts were revolving in the brain of the young girl there was an incessant interchange of chat being carried on in the servants' hall, the metallic tones of Fredericka's voice being first heard, and then the sharp, high soprano of the chamber-maid.
"Yes," said Rosa, suddenly breaking out into laughter, "my lady hardly knew where she was this evening, when the professor came home, saying that he had promised to join a party of ladies and gentlemen day after tomorrow in making an excursion to the Thuringian forests—he and a party! Good sakes! In Bonn he is buried in books the whole year round, when he is not visiting his patients and giving lectures at the University—that is all! Not a ball, not a soiree. Abominable! I cannot stand piety in a man!" 
"Fy upon you! for shame, Rosa!" scolded Fredericka as if provoked. "Only think if your lady should hear you!"
"Well, you see, everything has its limits. At the institute it used to be so that he would hardly eat or drink, so that he might be holy and blessed—and I can just tell you the other scholars could not bear him."
"People are too bad!   I suppose, then, they cannot bear him now either?"
"Oh, no—he is fairly idolized now.    How it came about I do not know, but his students pet him as if he were a baby, and the ladies—why, it is simply dreadful the fuss they make over him.    Why, they look ready to kiss his hand, if he does but write them a prescription.   My lady is no better than the rest—and many a time I get right mad to see her.    I could understand it if he were handsome, but an ugly man like that, with a red beard and awkward manners—just let him come near me, the uncivil bear!   He cures everything with his coarseness.    For instance, there lies my lady in spasms, he looks at her as if he could pierce her through with his eyes, and says 'compose yourself, Adele!    Get up directly!   I shall go out for a moment, and when I come back, shall expect to see you sitting there in that chair—have you understood me?'   And when he came back there she was sitting, to be sure, her spasms having left her; but tell me yourself if it is not dreadful to treat a lady of rank so?"
"He might have been more polite, indeed," agreed the old cook.
"He tyrannizes over her fearfully.    Her whole delight is in dressing herself up.    I can tell you, Fredericka, that in Bonn we have wardrobes stacked with clothes that you could never get tired looking at, and whatever is the fashion, there it is.    But because Mr. Growler preaches up simplicity all the time, my lady will never let him see her in an elegant dress—it must be mull, nothing but mull. If he only knew how much all that white toggery comes to!   He argued that the poor woman should by all means stay at home day after tomorrow, on account of little Anna—but then some other folks came and begged her to go along, and so for once she did not listen to him.    This blue stuff will make her a pretty traveling dress, don't you think so, Fredericka?"
These revelations of the gossiping maid made a painful impression upon Felicia. She slid down from her perch, in order once more to return to the servants' hall, thinking that her presence, perhaps, would put a stop to communications which certainly were not fitted to reach the ears of a stranger. Without any especial object her eye once more strayed to the side-building over against her. She was startled.    The astral lamp in the front hall of the second story cast its rays also into the long corridor which led to Aunt Cordelia's abode.    The first two windows were right brightly illuminated, showing the badly whitewashed back wall, whence emerged brownish old rafters.    Along this wall glided a figure, but by no means an unsubstantial one.    It was he whom the lady's-maid had called so ugly. Felicia could plainly see the strong outlines of his head, the flowing abundance of his full beard, the gigantic proportions of the upper part of his body, that certainly precluded any idea of elegance. He walked along, incessantly and mechanically stroking his beard, traversing the whole length of the corridor, up to the last window, which abutted upon the vestibule with the painted door, and behind which the very remote lamp-light glimmered only feebly and uncertainly; then he turned back.    Undoubtedly he was taking his nightly exercise, and because his cousin and her child slept under his room he had retired, for his walk, to this solitary and remote passage.
What was driving him so restlessly up and down? Was he solving some surgical problem, or was he pursued by the image of that absent one, for whose sake he must travel life's pathway in solitude?
Meditatively Felicia closed her window, drawing close its faded old green worsted curtains, which from time immemorial had guarded the dreams of the cooks in that old mansion-house.
CHAPTER XVII.
OUT in the garden, on the great meadow, which was overshadowed by nut-trees, the grass had been mown a few days before. A strong and refreshing fragrance ascended from the hay-mounds, on one of which Anna was comfortably stretching out her poor little limbs. Felicia leaned against the trunk of the largest one of the nut-trees, which had always been a favorite of hers. When a child her nimble feet had carried her to its very top, whence not only the green sod at her feet, but the whole world had appeared to her to be strewn with flowers. Her eye followed the gigantic trunk up to its very heart, whence mighty boughs boldly stretched out their arms into the air. Inside, underneath its rough bark, life was also pulsating; it mounted upward and streamed even into the tiny veins of the leaves, which like feelers, were pushed out into the world, and gave the old trunk plenty of work to do; they trembled at every breath of air, bristled up directly if a rough wind swept over them, and sunk down limp, if beaten upon by the burning rays of the sun; but let there be ever so much trembling, sighing, and rustling up there overhead, the trunk stood unmoved. And the child of man? How easily overthrown when the storm of destiny attacks him through his sensibilities!
This sober thought, often as it may be warranted, did not seem natural as emanating from so youthful a creature, whose beauty looked almost dazzlingly bright in contrast with the dark color of the tree, against the trunk of which she was resting—and had she not, tender and deep as were her sensibilities, defied storms that would have crushed thousands of her sex? Perhaps this melancholy reflection had its origin in unconscious dread, or sudden foreboding of a hidden danger, before which the unbending will of the young girl was yet to be made to succumb. How little do we comprehend ourselves the processes of our own soul's life. In a distorted, awkward fashion, such as would not seem possible to a cool and impartial view, and not until trying crises are overpassed, do we perceive that, in some sort, we have felt and been conscious of their approach.
Two days had already elapsed since the departure of the professor and his fair cousin. The former had entered the traveling-carriage with an expression of face and gesture that seemed to say he was shaking off a heavy burden, that was to be gladly and joyfully left behind him in the little town of X------.   On taking leave in the hall he had shaken hands with Rosa, Henry, and the old cook, but he had only touched the brim of his hat slightly in passing Felicia, and moved on with as much coolness and indifference as though the girl had never spoken a harsh word to him, nor looked at him with eyes whose defiant expression had so often provoked him. "Perfectly right and proper," thought Felicia, "exactly as I should always wish to have him act." But her look was downcast and her lips tightly compressed. The young widow had taken her place opposite to him. She had glided past in taking leave, like a fairy in bluish clouds, and the face beneath her Italian straw hat looked as radiantly hopeful as though she meant to bring home' from this excursion a happiness long ardently desired.
It was the second afternoon that Felicia had had to spend in the garden alone with little Anna; but not only peaceful hours had in this way come to her, but something pleasant—miraculous, as she called it—from abroad.    The adjoining garden, which was separated from the Hell wig grounds only by a line fence, had, a few days before, come into the possession of the Francke family.    Yesterday the young lawyer had exchanged a few words with her across the hedge, in his friendly, confidence-inspiring manner, and today a sweet, lovable old lady, in a black silk dress and pretty white cap, had stood in the same place and opened conversation with her.   She proved to be the mother of young Francke.   She lived in great retirement, devoting herself almost exclusively to the care of her husband and only son, and yet held a very high place in the estimation of her townspeople.    In prospect of Felicia's speedy departure from the Hellwig mansion, she had offered the young girl her advice and assistance.    An unexpected ray of sunshine had thus crossed the pathway of the actor's despised orphan; and, in spite of this encouragement there stood Felicia wrapped in gloomy meditation by the old nut-tree.    The breeze rustled softly among the branches overhead; she smiled sadly, for in those whispers she seemed to hear a lament over a paradise lost.    The wretched days of her early youth passed in review before her, and yet darker looked the prospect of her future—she seemed destined to struggle and suffer to the bitter end; but that fate was at this very moment aiming a blow at her which was to crush even the few faint hopes that she still dared entertain of future happiness in life, she little dreamed.
Henry had come in at the garden-gate only a few minutes before; it had seemed as if he were making all haste to reach Felicia, but he had then disappeared behind a wall of evergreens. Now he advanced more slowly. Upon a first glance at the honest fellow's broad but distorted countenance, the young girl knew that he had bad news to communicate—from what quarter did it come? She sprung forward to meet him, and, full of anxiety, grasped his hand,
"Yes, little Fay, I cannot help you. You’ll have to learn it some time," said he, dispiritedly, while he drew his inverted horny hand across his forehead, and turned away his eyes.   "Well, you see, poor thing, it is the natural course of life in this world—"
"Go on!" she interposed, hoarsely, almost shrieking; but then clinched her teeth convulsively.
"And yet—the Lord help me, how am I to tell you, if you take it so?    The Old Ma'm'selle—"
"Is dead!" gasped she, in horror-stricken tones. "Not yet, little Fay; and yet, indeed, she is as good as gone, for she no longer knows anybody—she has had a stroke of apoplexy.    Ah! and what a dear motherly soul she has been to all of us!    The nurse found her in the aviary, stretched on the ground; she had just been seeing to the wants of the poor creatures—"    Here voice failed him, and he wept like a child.
Felicia stood stunned at first, the last drop of blood seeming to have faded from her pale face; mechanically, she pressed her small hands to her throbbing temples, but not a tear came from her eye. For an instant only a smile of unspeakable bitterness curved her lips, then with unnatural calmness she felt for her hat, which lay upon a hay mound, summoned Rosa, who was sitting at work near by, an committed the child into her care.
"Are you unwell?" asked the lady's maid, for she was alarmed by the young girl's statue-like appearance an ashy pale face.
"Yes, she is sick," answered Henry, in Felicia's stead who had moved rapidly in the direction of the garden gate. "Fay, dear, compose yourself!" exhorted he, walking along with her part of the way; "the madame is with her—good is it that the poor Ma'm'selle does not know! Dr. Bohm has already left—he can do nothing more. Ah! and that it should happen today, just today! You are verily a child of ill luck!"
Felicia did not hear what he was saying—the words fell upon her ears unintelligibly; no more did she see the people whom she met in the streets. Unnoticed by Fredericka, she reached home, and went upstairs. In the attic entry she threw her hat into a corner. The door of the aviary was ajar, and there issued from it a medley of discordant sounds. How carefully guarded had this door always been, lest some tiny fugitive might make its escape. Now the young girl went past without moving a finger—these forsaken creatures might seek a livelihood in the open air now if they liked, for they had no one now to care for them with fostering tenderness.
She entered the large drawing-room; from the adjoining sleeping closet might be heard the harsh, monotonous tones of Mrs. Hellwig's voice, resounding in a place where for many years the air had been only disturbed by the sweet language of music, or the inexpressibly mild accents of an intellectual woman, whose soul was fall of love to all mankind. Now the big woman was reading aloud from one of those so-called choice selections of hymns, which, composed by persons of little culture to suit their own immature views, have no power now to act as mediators between heaven and the human soul, their tones of expression and mode of thought being entirely alien from what are accepted now by persons of intelligence. These crude sentiments, clothed in halting and commonplace verse, to be drawled out in the ears of a departing soul, the whole of whose life had been dedicated to a study of the beautiful, and who had found the fittest expression for her reverence for God in true poetry and the divine melodies of the inspired masters!
Noiselessly as a shadow Felicia glided into the chamber of death.    Mrs.  Hellwig read on without noticing her. There, under the white bed-curtains which rose and fell softly like wings, moved by the breeze that came in at the open window, as though, too, they were ready to receive the parting soul and bear it upward, there lay the Old Ma'm'selle.    Ah! how pallid and ghastly was her face. Oh! the cruelty of death, in that while our loved ones are yet with us, ere he tears them forever from our embrace and our earthly sight, he disfigures them so horribly that we involuntarily shrink back in dismay from viewing features wherein we have always been accustomed to read only the language of love and intimate affection!
The deeply sunken eyelids were not fast closed yet.   The eyeballs wandered restlessly hither and thither; a slight rattling accompanied the heavy, long-drawn breaths; at brief intervals the right arm was lifted as though preparing to strike, and then the cramped and rigid fingers would fall back helplessly upon the coverlid.    What a frightful spectacle for the young girl, who there saw extinguished the last ray of love that shone upon her miserable life!
Felicia drew near the bed. With boundless astonishment Mrs. Hellwig lifted her eyes from her hymn-book, and stared at the deadly pale, tearless countenance that bent over the bed.
"What would you have here, you brazen creature?" asked she aloud and recklessly, lifting her immense hand and pointing with it to the door.
Felicia did not reply, but the interruption to that monotonous reading aloud seemed to make an impression upon the dying woman.    She tried to fix her eyes, and they fell upon Felicia.    In that ray lay joyful recognition; her lips moved—at first, indeed, with no result; there was inexpressible pathos in that struggle to make herself understood,  and lo! energy of soul did conquer in fact,  and forced into service once more the already half-dead mechanism of the body.    "Fetch a justice," came from her lips plainly, but with a peculiar gurgling noise. The young girl immediately left the room.    Not a minute was to be lost.    She flew through the vestibule, but at the same instant that she passed the aviary, the door to which was wide open, Felicia felt herself jerked backward by powerful hands, that also, with a strong push, hurled her into the middle of the room, while the door was shut to behind her and locked from the outside.    A really hellish hubbub arose around her; the terrified birds screeched, and circled wildly about her.    Felicia had fallen to the ground, but in tumbling forward she had caught at one of the fir-trees standing in the middle of the room, and dragged it down with her.    What had happened?    She gathered herself up, and threw back the hair that had fallen in a mass over her face.    She had seen nobody, heard no step, and yet some one had stood behind her, and with demoniacal force mastered her, in a moment, when the execution of a dying friend's wishes was at stake, and when, with the lapse of every minute, her soul incurred the most terrible responsibility.
She rushed to the door, but it was fast locked; her knocking and rattling were drowned by the horrible clamor that the birds once more were raising around her. The excited little creatures circled over her head, senselessly beating themselves against the walls, and only becoming quiet after the poor girl had let her arms drop, in the quietness of despair. Who was to let her out? Assuredly not the hands that had so ruthlessly thrust her in! She only knew too well that iron grip—they were the same hands that had just held a hymn-book; she had thrown it away, in order to perform a deed of violence, and now that dreadful woman sat again by the deathbed, droning on, in her monotonous, unfeeling manner, reading that had no point in it. Unpityingly she had seen how her dying fellow mortal prolonged the death-struggle, through intense desire, for one more chance, to do a little good here below. Poor Aunt Cordelia! she bade farewell to this world, in which she had been a solitary wayfarer, under bitter illusion—the last impressions which her soul had carried away with it were religious fanaticism, in the shape of that hateful woman, and he ingratitude of mankind, grown to be proverbial, and of which Felicia seemed to present an example. This thought nearly drove the young girl mad. Beside herself she ran up and down, again and again knocking at the door with renewed energy, but all in vain. Why had she been locked in? She was to have fetched a lawyer—Aunt Cordelia had bidden her to—did she want to make a last confession? No, no, the Old Ma'm'selle had nothing to confess. If she had been forced to carry a burden of guilt with her through life it had been the crime of some one else, to which she might innocently have become the witness, but the participant, never—the Old Ma'm'selle could never have had a guilty secret of her own. Perhaps she had wanted to dispose of her property, and this was what occasioned the venom of that bad woman. If Aunt Cordelia died without a will then her whole property fell to the Hellwig family. Who knows how many poor and unhappy people were at this minute being deprived of a support, which would have made them happy for the rest of their lives, while the merchant's family, already reputed very wealthy, were once more, through the cunning of a woman, to add to their heaps of silver and gold.
Felicia stepped to the window and looked down upon the neighboring houses. She peered around anxiously for a single human being that she might appeal to for help, but the houses were all so far down below that she was neither seen nor heard. How her pulses beat from torture of soul and feverish excitement! She threw herself upon the only chair that stood in the room, and burst into tears of despair. In any case it was too late now, even though she were made free this very minute.    Perhaps the dear eyes up there had already failed, and the heart ceased to beat—that heart, the agony of whose last moments had been heightened by hoping in vain for Felicia's reappearance. The common consolation that the glorified spirit would now know why her expectation had been disappointed did not exist for the logically acute mind of this thoughtful young girl. It is difficult to imagine that the human spirit, which, comformably to God's plan with all that He has created, must go through countless phases before gradually reaching perfection, should, immediately after throwing off the shackles of earthly short-sightedness, be endowed with the divine attribute of omniscience, and, from beyond the tomb, be capable of looking down upon the transactions of the dwellers upon earth, reading the most secret motives of the human breast as easily as they could con the pages of an open book.
She must have passed much more than two hours in imprisonment, alternating between fits of dull grief and frantic attempts to liberate herself. Her surroundings had become hideous to her. Those irrational creatures, once her pets, that whenever she lifted an arm screeched furiously and fluttered around in desperation, to her diseased imagination now seemed converted into phantoms, and she trembled before her own movements.
Moreover evening came on; it grew dark in that uncanny place, and her bosom was rent with the first bitter pangs of grief for the friend whom she was losing.    Hers was a situation calculated to madden.    Once more she ran to the door as though stunned by surprise; she stood still; the lock yielded beneath her hand without offering the slightest opposition.    In the vestibule outside all was still as death; Felicia would have supposed that she had been haunted by some frightful dream had not the drawing-room remained fast locked.    She looked through the key-hole; a strong gust of wind met her, the hanging ivy on the wall swung wildly hither and thither; they had opened the window— yes, all was over, over!    Down in the front part of the house the cook sat knitting at the open back door, as she was accustomed to do of a pleasant summer evening. From the kitchen came up the odor of freshly baked cakes, for Fredericka had only a little while ago drawn from the oven a tin full of cracknela such as Mrs. Hellwig liked particularly with her coffee; so everything down here was pursuing its usual course, while up yonder a member of the family had departed this life.    Felicia went into the servants' room.     Immediately afterward   Henry   walked   in.    He quietly hung his hat upon a nail, then drew near to Felicia, and without speaking offered her his hand.    The grief-worn look of the eyes—evidently red from weeping—in that old, weather-beaten countenance, touched the young girl to the quick; so, jumping up, she flung her arms around his neck and burst into a passionate fit of weeping.
"You saw her once more, did you not, little Fay?" asked he, softly, after a pause. "Fredericka says the madame closed her eyes. Alas, could there have been none other than these hands? There was no talk of you, although it takes no Solomon to tell that the madame would have gone raving mad to have seen you up there. Where did you hide, then?"
Felicia's tears ceased flowing directly. With flashing eyes she told him what had happened. Like somebody possessed, he ran up and down the room.
"Is such a thing possible?" he cried again and again, tearing his gray hair with both hands. "Could the dear Lord allow such injustice? Alas! alas! And now suppose you go and tell the story! They would not listen to you in court, because you have no witnesses, and not a person in the whole town would believe you, for she is the pious, good Mrs. Hellwig, and you— And how cunningly she did it!" he burst out, wrathfully, interrupting his own train of thought. "Just at a moment when the birds were making most noise she sneakingly unlocked the door again. Yes, yes, I shall always say it—she is one of the worst of women! Fay, you poor unlucky child, she has robbed you. tomorrow some gentlemen of the court were to have waited upon the Old Ma'm'selle—tomorrow afternoon, about two o'clock, she was to have made her will—in your favor. 'Yes, yes,’ she said, 'who knows how near I am my end?' She was so astonishingly 'cute. Any of us would have grown gray from so much cleverness as was in this woman's head; but she had not rightly learned everything else she would not have waited so long."
CHAPTER XVIII.
IT was still very early in the morning when Mrs. Hellwig appeared in the front yard.   Instead of the white cap which she had worn almost invariably for so many years, cut precisely after one  pattern,  her sallow, fleshy cheeks were shaded by black lace.    That wicked creature, who had so often desecrated the Lord's clay by ungodly tunes and gay manners, was dead now, and the last trace of her despised existence had already disappeared from the home of her ancestors; the corpse had  been removed so early as the evening before to the house for the reception of the dead previous to interment.    In spite of all this the deceased had borne the name of Hellwig—to her, therefore, referred the black lace arid crape-tie that today took the place of her well starched linen collar around the neck of the fat woman.
She opened the door through which Felicia had once seen the Old Ma'm’selle disappear. Besides the familiar steps, behind which lay the painted door, a second passage led by a narrow winding staircase up to the attic, and indeed directly from the narrow, steep street; this being the way which Henry and the nurse had used, and to which also the yard-gate led.
Just as ever the plaster-casts looked down from their high pedestals, but genius had taken its flight from the room which yon great fat woman now entered with the assured air of one who holds undisputed possession. A cold, contemptuous smile played around her lips, while she traversed the suite of apartments, whose every individual piece of furniture gave evidence of the cultivated mind and refined tastes of its former owner; but she scowled as her eyes surveyed the rows of handsomely bound volumes ranged on the shelves of the glass press, the backs of which all bore the name of some distinguished author or composer.
She seized hold of a large bunch of keys that lay on the candle-stand, and opened a secretary—evidently the most interesting article of furniture in her estimation. Model order prevailed throughout all of its compartments; one after the other was ransacked; bundles of papers, and manuscript pamphlets, yellow with age, were brought to view, tied up with faded ribbons.    Her fat, white hands impatiently rooted among them.    What cared she for all this scribbling; she had no curiosity, not she! More tenderly did she handle a little casket that was found filled to the brim with documents.    With great attention, and a look of inward satisfaction Mrs. Hellwig unfolded them leaf by leaf; she was an admirable hand at calculation, and in a trice had computed the very considerable sum total of the funds represented here, which were admirably invested and secured.    They exceeded her expectation.
Her search was by no means ended thereby, however, for then came various bureaus and wardrobes, one after the other, and the longer Mrs. Hellwig looked the more impatient and hurried she became.    Gradually her face reddened as her clumsy figure moved, with unusual alacrity, from room to room, recklessly rummaging through the boxes of clothes, tumbling together the neatly folded collars and caps of the deceased, pushing glass and china about until they jingled and clattered alarmingly—and yet, what she was in search of did not appear.    That she knocked over various flower-pots,  and  snapped off  branches and blossoms, by means of her awkward movements from side to side, was a matter of perfect indifference to her—just now she had not even her stereotyped contemptuous smile for all this "trash " and "tom-foolery."
Fredericka was just feeding the poultry down in the yard; Mrs. Hellwig called to her to send up the man-servant directly, and stepped back in order to begin the search over again.
"Do you not know where aunt used to keep her silverware?" exclaimed she as soon as Henry made his appearance. "From what my mother-in-law told me, I know that there must be a great deal. She had at least two dozen heavy silver tablespoons, an equal number of beautifully gilded coffee-spoons, likewise silver candlesticks, a tea-service and cream-pitcher," this catalogue (with a faithfulness of memory worthy of all admiration) rolled off her tongue, as though she read from a book. "I can find nothing of all this—where can they be hidden?"
"That I do not know, madame," answered Henry, quietly. He walked up to a table, opened a drawer to it, and took out two silver knives and forks. "This is all the silver I know of as having belonged to the blessed Old Ma'm’selle," said he. "I used often to clean it, because the nurse did not do it well enough."
Mrs. Hellwig stalked up and down, angrily biting her lips. The strict reserve that she was always in the habit of preserving in presence of her servants momentarily forsook her.
"It would be a pretty story, a real scandal, if the old thing had sold these valuable old family pieces, or could she possibly have given them away?" she said, to be sure, rather as if talking to herself. "They must be here, though. I'll not rest until they are found! She had jewelry, too, very pretty sets; for I know that everything of the sort owned by the Hellwig family was divided between her and my mother-in-law." She paused, for at this moment her glance fell upon the glass press that held the notebooks. She had not examined that yet. The press itself stood upon a heavy chest that was surrounded by very handsomely carved wooden doors. She tore these open. Piles of carefully arranged periodicals filled its two shelves. That cruelly malicious look of hers came out, with redoubled force, now that her countenance was so unusually excited, her upper lip doubling itself up until almost the whole row of her neatly kept, strong upper teeth were seen. She drew out one bundle after another and slung it upon the floor so that single numbers flew far land near.
The old man was boiling with indignation. He clinched his fists and stared almost wildly at such vandalism. He had himself brought all these papers from the post-office, which had supplied the recluse with a never-failing source of refreshment and joy—even now he could see her friendly eyes sparkle as he lay a newly arrived number upon her table.
"Here we have the arch-enemies of Holy Church together in a lump!" she murmured.    "These miserable sheets, this hellish filth!    Yes, yes, she carried it with a high hand, the God-forsaken old maid, and to think of my having been compelled to stay under the same roof with her, for lo! these many years."
She straightened herself up, and looked behind the glass door.   At sight of the music books a sudden burst of rude laughter escaped her lips.    She opened the press and bade Henry fetch a clothes-basket.    He had to cram into the basket all the books and loose music that lay upon the shelves, the faithful old fellow racking his brain to discover what would be the fate of those beautiful books, whence the Old Ma'm'selle had discoursed  such  enchanting music. The stout woman stood by and looked on severely to see that not a stray leaf was left behind; she touched none of them herself, it almost seeming as if she feared lest her fingers be scorched.
Finally she ordered the man-servant to carry the basket down into-the front of the house. She carefully locked all the doors to the attic, and slowly followed him. To Fredericka's vexation, who had a horror of such visits, she entered the kitchen. Henry had to set down his burden and bring a pair of shears from the sitting-room. The old cook had just made up a rousing fire.
"You may spare your wood today, Fredericka!" said Mrs. Hellwig, picking up a loose pamphlet and casting it into the flames. The pretty portfolios with the Old Ma'm'selle's rare collection of autographs lay on top of the basket. The ribbon strings with which they were tied together were undone one after the other, beneath the quietly but steadily manipulating fingers of the stout woman. Huzza, how the devouring flames leaped up! Here, once more flashed up the name of "Glück" in scarlet splendor; there glowed, like fiery pearls, the round notes to a brilliant caprice of Cimarosa's, in order, immediately afterward, to be wrapped in one and the same mantle of flame, Italian, German, and French impatiently embraced in a common combustion.
Henry had stood by, at first, as if in a stupor; fury choked him. The corpse of the poor recluse was yet above ground, and here this unfeeling woman had already taken possession of her property, plundering and destroying, as the roughest soldier would hardly have ventured to do in an enemy's country.
"But, madame," said he finally, "there might be a will!"
Mrs. Hellwig raised her face, flushed from exposure to the fire, and it displayed a mixture of scorn and displeasure.
"Since when have I given you leave to favor me with your wise suggestions?" asked she cuttingly.
Just now, she held in her hands the manuscript of the Bach operetta, about which the Old Ma'm'selle had recently said that there was only this one copy in existence, and that some day it would be worth its weight in gold. More energetically than before, and with a peculiar vim, she slashed, and tore the leaves to atoms, and stuffed them under the grate.
At this moment there was a loud ring at the door-bell. Henry went to open it, and an officer of justice entered, attended by a constable. He bowed to the amazed mistress of the house, as she came forth from the kitchen, and introduced himself in his capacity of commissioner of the court, charged with the duty of sealing up the property left by the deceased Miss Cordelia Hellwig.
Perhaps for the first time in her life Mrs. Hellwig was startled out of her rigid composure and self-assurance. "Seal up!" stammered she. "There is a will deposited at the clerk's office."That is a mistake!" she exclaimed.    "I know most positively that, in accordance with her father's will, she had no power to make a will—it all reverts to the house of Hellwig."
"I am sorry," said the official, shrugging his shoulders. "The will exists, nevertheless, and however sorry I maybe to incommode you, my duty obliges me to proceed forthwith to affix the seals."
Mrs. Hellwig bit her lips, seized the keys to the habitation in the attic, and preceded the officer of the law. Bui Henry, for his part, ran in triumph to Felicia, who had already resumed her office as child's nurse; but today, much to Anna's astonishment, she sat by the prattling little one as still and impassive as a statue. Henry told her of what had just happened. Upon hearing his description of the auto-da-fe, she started up.
"Were the sheets that she burned single ones?" asked she, with smothered voice.
"Yes; single sheets. They were in red portfolios, with beautiful ribbons hanging from them—"
She no longer listened to him, and hurried down into the kitchen. There stood the basket, which still held different piano-pieces and music-books, but the portfolios lay open and scattered on the brick floor, not a single page of their contents being left in them. The draught had blown a little torn scrap of paper into the corner of the hearth. Felicia picked it up. "The score of John Sebastian Bach, written by himself, and given by him, as a memento, in the year 1707. Gotthelf von Hirschsprung," she read with streaming eyes. This was the last relic of the mysterious manuscript—its melodies were hushed forever!
So far as appearances went, Mrs. Hellwig had not intended, in the beginning, to shorten her son's pleasure trip on account of their relation's death, but after the sealing up of the effects, from which she returned with a lowering countenance, whereon were inscribed chagrin and suppressed passion, she hastily dispatched a few lines of recall.    The will was to be opened immediately after the interment according to the desire of the departed, and for this ceremony Mrs. Hellwig needed support, for she was altogether more out of sorts than ever before in her life.    The possible loss of a considerable property, that she had always deemed inalienable, had a terrific effect in depressing even her iron nerves.
The excursion had not been very definitely planned. "We may turn in whatever direction we fancy, and pitch our tents whenever the notion seizes us," had been their programme; therefore, Mrs. Hellwig had to direct her note accordingly—no very easy matter.    The search with which she had begun the day in the attic was now continued in the room of her deceased husband.    The proofs must be found, among the family papers, that the Old Ma'm'selle had no right to dispose of her property as she chose.    She had very probably laid by savings from her income—such had been her supposition even yesterday afternoon—the lock to the aviary door had done its duty bravely then, and kept this fund, too, in the family.    Let the stout woman worry and puzzle her brains over it as she might, she could not explain, even to herself, whence came the firm conviction that she had entertained for so many years.    Had she read herself the directions left by Cordelia Hellwig's father; or, had it been the verbal communication of some trustworthy individual?—enough; she was still convinced, and the papers must be found.    She searched and read, until small drops of perspiration stood out upon her pale forehead—this had been a veritable day of ill luck—her investigations were as barren of result here as they had been in the attic in the morning. Fortune prefers to drop her sweetest roses at the feet of cold-hearted, calculating, unimaginative people; she seems to think that she bestows, of her treasures, less safely upon richly endowed natures, than upon those who not only keep their money-chests, but the souls likewise, tightly barred with iron bolts.    This stout woman was one of these spoiled children of fortune; therefore, she was greatly amazed at this one day of misfortune.
Two days had elapsed, while most probably the letter mailed was still safely packed in the post-chaise meandering through the green valleys of the Thuringian forest, and the corpse of the Old Ma'm'selle was committed to the earth, without having a single mourner bearing the Hellwig name to follow behind the coffin.
Felicia bore her deep grief in silence, with that self-control that formed a component part of her character. That weakness which seeks comfort in talking with others, she knew not—from the time of her childhood she had been accustomed to battling alone with all her troubles, and letting the wounds of her spirit bleed on unstanched, without those nearest her suspecting their existence. She had, as matter of principle, refrained from looking upon the dead.  That last conscious look cast upon her by her dying friend for her, had the significance of a last farewell—she did not want to retain that dear face in her memory as separated from the soul. But on the afternoon of the day c burial, after Mrs. Hellwig had gone out, she took one of the keys that hung in the servants' room, viz., the one the unlocked the corridor, upon which opened the trash-room already familiar to the reader. The corpulence of the mistress of the house having increased with her years, she avoided climbing steps as much as possible, and hence the old cook had for a long while had the undisputed privilege of access to all the rooms on the highest floor.
Aunt Cordelia should, this very day, have some fresh flowers on her grave; but only such as she had planted herself. The mansard rooms, with the exception of the aviary had been sealed up—hence no one could reach the hanging-garden in that way, which had thus been deprived of the attention it required, through the remissness of the officer of the law. For the first time after nine years, Felicia again stood at the window of the chamber under the roof, and looked across at the flower-covered roof opposite. Ah, how much lay between that miserable day, when her ill-used child-soul had risen up in revolt against God and man, and now! Over yonder had been her home—there had the recluse taken to her large, noble woman's heart the despised actor's child, and comforted her, using all the weapons with which her enlightened spirit endowed her, to ward off this murderous thrust made at her soul.
There the child had learned unweariedly, and, in consequence of this learning, had for the first time lived truly. He, who, at this moment was enjoying, in the company of fair women, an excursion among the glorious Thuringian woods—how little did he suspect that his plan of education, based upon prejudice and gloomy fanatical modes of thought, had been brought to naught only by a few venturous steps over the two slender gutters down there!
And now this hazardous path must be once more traversed. Felicia got out of the window, and crossed over the roofs; quickly and lightly she accomplished her undertaking, and soon had the even floor of the gallery under her feet. The poor things there, who nodded their little heads so harmlessly in the mild breeze, were far worse off than the lilies of the field. Retained, as though by magic, high up in the air, they knew nothing of their sweet Mother Earth, nothing of that strong natural home, which presses strongly to its heart the base of the mighty tree as well as the tender, fibrous root of the smallest flower; their weal and woe had depended upon a pair of withered little white hands, that were now resting calmly folded, returned themselves to Mother Earth. As yet, however, the outcasts felt not their orphanage, for several times it had rained hard in the night, so that just now they vied with one another in beauty and fragrance.
Felicia pressed her face against the glass door, and looked into the front room. There stood the little round table; the knitting, with one needle half knitted off, lay beside its ball of yarn, as though it had just been laid down to be picked up again the next minute. Straight across an open volume lay the old lady's spectacles, and, with deep emotion, her young friend read a few lines; the last intellectual enjoyment which the Old Ma'm'selle had tasted upon earth was Antony’s speech in Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar." Beyond, in the drawing-room, stood the beloved piano, and near it glittered the panes of her great glass press; she could see its rows of empty shelves, since, in faithless fashion, the old piece of furniture had allowed itself to be robbed of its musical treasures, which were now reduced to ashes. On the contrary, it had held others so much the more closely. Mrs. Hellwig had in vain sought for the Old Ma'm'selle's stores of silver. Just now a thought struck Felicia with terror. The secret compartment of the press contained not only silver and jewelry, but in one corner stood a little gray paper box. ''It must die before me!" Aunt Cordelia had said. Was it destroyed? It must not, on any account, fall into the hands of the heirs, and yet the Old Ma'm'selle had never had the courage to lay hands upon it herself. It was more than probable that it still existed. If the will should designate the place where her plate was kept, then, most likely, a secret would come to light which the Old Ma'm'selle had used every exertion to hide from the world—this must not be done.
The glass door of the front room was bolted from the inside. With prompt determination Felicia broke one of the panes of glass and caught at the bolt; but this availed nothing, somebody having locked the door and carried off the key—a sad discovery! An uprising of passionate rebellion took possession of her against a destiny that consistently interposed whenever she hoped to work in Aunt Cordelia's behalf. With her grief for the deceased mingled anxiety as to what would come now. Here was a hard question that suggested itself. Would the contents of the little gray box be calculated to silence the evil reports that had gotten abroad concerning the Old Ma'm'selle? Or would they, mystically and irrefutably perhaps, cast a yet deeper shadow over the character of the departed?
She cut off a lovely bouquet, without loss of time, stuck two pots of auriculas—Aunt Cordelia's favorites—into her basket, and retraced her steps over the roofs with a far heavier heart than that with which she had come.
Already this young girl had three graves to tend out in the vast, quiet field of the dead! The earth covered those whom she loved best, about whom her heart had intwined itself with all the warmth and fervor of its nature. She cast up toward heaven an unspeakably mournful glance as she scattered flowers over Aunt Cordelia's newly made grave —she had nothing more to lose now! Her father had not been heard of for long years. His body, too, was probably moldering underground in some far-off spot. Over yonder on a costly slab of marble, shone, in gold letters, the name Frederick Hell wig, and here—she moved toward her mother's grave, which, thanks to the attention bestowed by the Old Ma'm'selle, had always been covered with rare flowers, during the pleasant season of the year. But now the headstone lay flat beside the mound; only a few days ago, Henry had declared that the inscription must be renewed, seeing that it was well-nigh effaced. It was presumable, then, that the stone had been taken up at his instance. It had sunken until the earth was close to the name of her whom it was meant to commemorate; now the whole inscription might be seen. "Meta d'Orlowsky," Felicia read with clouded brow, but further on, below, there was another name, which the earth had completely hidden until now. Of the black color, indeed, there remained only a faint trace, here and there, upon the letters; but they were cut in the stand-stone—"nee Von Hirschsprung of Kiel " might be deciphered without difficulty.
Felicia became lost in deep thought. This name had been on the manuscript of the Bach operetta; it had, moreover, pertained to an ancient race of Thuringian noblemen, whose coat of arms was yet emblazoned on all the walls of the old mansion, now occupied by the Hellwigs—the little breastpin in Felicia's possession also showed the same device of the leaping stag—marvelous riddle! The proud race that, in its latest generations, had been obliged to handle the plane and awl, had been long since extinct. When a child, Henry had known the last of the name—he had been a student at Leipsic, dying young and unmarried—and yet, fourteen years ago, from the far North, a young married lady had come, who had borne this name in the house of her parents, and claimed the coat of arms. Could a branch of the old Thuringian stock have been somehow lopped off, and cast away in the distance? You, proud knight, who thought to perpetuate your form by leaving its impress on the stone plate in your lordly mansion, come out of your pewter coffin and traverse this home of the dead! Various stones bear your name, and beneath them rest men with hands toughened by labor, men who had to eat their bread in the sweat of their brows, while you left behind, sealed and signed, as if for eternity, the claims and privileges of your race; while you closed your eyes in the undisturbed idea that your noble blood had insured the aristocratic hands of your posterity from the defilement of work. Step here to this grave that covers the dust of a stray daughter of your house. The bread that she eat was worse than hardly earned, it was despised—she had to take part in a trick of jugglery for the amusement of the public, and by this jugglery lost her blooming life. You did not reflect on that vicissitude of fortune, which, in the history of the world and men, today uplifts a wave to heaven, and tomorrow opens an abyss in order afterward to treacherously smooth and level both again!
Could any of the relations of Felicia's mother be living still? The young girl answered this question for herself with a bitter smile; at all events they had no longer any existence for the daughter of Meta von Hirschsprung. Twice had they been publicly appealed to and still maintained a consistent silence. Perhaps this branch of the old race had kept its original purity until the time when a daughter of the same had given her heart and hand to a juggler. She had been thrust forth from the paradise of aristocratic splendor, from the circle of her own family, never to be admitted there again. So much was certain, that her child should never cross the threshold of those who had publicly disowned the wife of the juggler.
CHAPTER XIX.
AFTER leaving the grave-yard, Felicia did not return to the house on Market Square. Rosa and Anna were expecting her in the garden, where Mrs. Hellwig was also to come toward evening, and take supper with the child under the acacia-trees. That stout lady had apparently recovered her outward tranquillity, only it was remarked that she went out much more than usual, leaving the impression that she felt the need of some distraction for her mind until her son's arrival, and perhaps, too, of giving some expression to her thoughts.
Her purpose seemed to ignore utterly her meeting with Felicia in the attic. Apparently she had not taken in the idea that Felicia could have had any intercourse with the Old Ma'm'selle, but conceived the impression that her intrusion had been prompted merely by curiosity, a fault that, under other circumstances, would not have gone unpunished; but, in consideration of the subsequent events of that evening having, undoubtedly, gone according to the lady's desire, she had thought best to forget that little episode as speedily as possible.
Felicia had, with fleet steps, almost traversed the whole length of the town, and now paused before a garden-gate. She drew a deep breath, and then placed her hand determinedly upon the latch, and opened the gate; it led into the neighboring garden, now in possession of the Francke family. The young girl was now left solitary and alone, entirely dependent upon her own resources. Torn, as was her soul by grief, this inward suffering had no influence upon the energy of her character, trained as it had already been in the school of adversity; her extraordinarily clear head, too, was soon able to cope with the inevitable, bitter though it was, for never yet had perturbation of mind caused a diversion of the keenly logical course of her train of thought.
The gentle, very distinguished-looking lady in the white cap, who had conversed with Felicia a few days before, sat drawing in a shady arbor; she immediately recognized her visitor, and eagerly beckoned her to approach.
"Ah! there comes my little, young neighbor, and she wants good advice, does she not?" asked she with winning affability, inviting Felicia to take a seat by her side. The young girl told her that she must leave the Hellwig family at the end of three weeks, and seek a place elsewhere.
'' Will you not give me some idea of your capabilities, my dear?" asked the lady, letting her large, intelligent eyes (strongly reminding of her son's) rest upon Felicia's countenance, that had now become very red. For, had she not now to speak of acquirements hitherto looked upon as contraband? Must she not suddenly expose them to view, just as a merchant does his wares? Ah! it was an unspeakably painful feeling, and yet there was no help for it.
"I believe that I could teach French, German, geography, and history passably well," said she hesitatingly. "I have had some practice in drawing, too; my musical education is not thorough, but yet I am competent to teach a correct method of singing."
The eyes of her auditor opened wide with astonishment.   "Then I can cook, wash, iron, and scour, too, if desired."   These last articles of confession came out with incomparably greater glibness than the first ones.
"You would not care to stay in our quiet little town of X------, would you?" asked the lady quickly.
"A longer stay is certainly not to be desired, and yet I have the graves of loved ones here, that I would not like to be parted from in too great haste."
"Well, then, I will tell you something.   The companion of my sister, who lives in Dresden, is about to be married; this place will be vacant in six months, and I shall recommend you to fill it.    Meanwhile, you must make your home with me.    Are you agreed to this?"
Surprised and grateful, Felicia kissed her hand, but then straightened herself up, and looked at the old lady with touching expression that spoke unmistakably of a wish that yet lay upon her heart.
"You have something upon your mind still, have you not? If we are to live long together, we must be perfectly candid in the first place, and so speak out!" she said encouragingly.
"I should like to ask you to give a decided character to my position in your family, though it be of the most subordinate and of the briefest duration," answered Felicia promptly and firmly.
"Ah, yes, I understand! You are tired of eating bread that has to be earned hardly enough, and which—to speak plainly—in spite of this, bears the semblance of charity received.''
Felicia assented earnestly.
"Well, you are to occupy no such trying position with us, my dear spirited child. I herewith engage you as lady's companion. Of course, you shall neither wash, iron nor scour; but sometimes when my old Dora and I are ailing or worn, you will see to things in the kitchen, will you not?"
"Oh, how gladly!" And for the first time since Aunt Cordelia's death, a faint smile crossed the young girl’s saddened countenance.
A sly sunbeam, that had been sporting hither and thither through the wild grape-vines that overarched the shad walk, was suddenly seen no more—for twilight had come Felicia was reminded that she must be at her post ere Mrs. Hellwig made her appearance, and therefore asked leave to withdraw. Her amiable friend dismissed her with a warm pressure of the hand, and in a few minutes she was standing in the Hellwig garden, holding little Anna in her arms. Soon afterward came Fredericka too, puffing and blowing, as she set down a heavy basket of china and glass, with which she had come laden.
"Well, they got home about an hour by sun!" cried she, well-nigh out of breath, and evidently out of temper, too. "Such a time of confusion as we are having now I never saw in all my life before. My mistress calls to me, just as soon as she catches sight of the carriage coming over the Market Square, that now she would have supper served in town; so I get everything ready in good faith—when, lo! and behold! here comes another order—the professor wants to take tea in the garden, by all manner of means; and then, there is nothing left for me to do, but pack up all my things together and lug them out here, as best I can."
So saying, she ran to a garden bed and cut off a few heads of lettuce.
"I tell you, we had a scene of it, a terrible scene of it!" said she mysteriously; while Felicia stood by her dressing salad at the kitchen-table. "The madame did not even stop to say 'how d'ye do?' before she was into the story of the last will. Listen, Caroline, I never did see my mistress in such a taking in all my life before! But the young gentleman had his share of nonsense to show off with; he declared that his old aunt had been dreadfully treated—like a perfect outcast, nobody in the family caring whether she lived or died, and so, he could not see, for the life of him, why people who had despised her all her life, should want to put her money into their pockets now that she was dead. Her fortune had never once entered his head. And in the midst of it all, if the madame paused a moment for breath, he asked every time if they were all well at home. He struck me as being very curious—and there was the poor lady, looking as if she had lost her last morsel of bread!"
Felicia, as was her custom, said not a word in reply to the old cook's gossiping. She took her sewing and sat with it under the nut-tree, while Anna played near her on the grass. From her place, through a small gap in the screen-like wall of evergreen-trees intervening, she could   see straight to the garden-gate.
This trellis door of fine cast-iron, set on either side between blooming bushes of sweetbrier, while behind it stretched invitingly a magnificent avenue of linden-trees, bad always had a mysterious charm for the young girl. She had seen many people come and go through this gate; friendly, beloved faces that she had once run rejoicingly to meet; but forms, too, the sight of which sent a chill to her heart, and behind which she had gladly, and with a sigh of relief, heard the peculiar clicking sound of the shutting gate. Never yet, though, had she experienced such a shock, such a thrilling emotion that nearly resembled pain, as at this instant, when the iron gate was pushed forward with a jar, admitting to the garden Mrs. Hellwig leaning on her son's arm, followed by the younger widow. What had she to fear from that man? Mrs. Hellwig ignored her existence as much as possible, and yon man too had also given up bringing the juggler's daughter over to his views, in accordance with which she was and must ever be an outcast, proscribed from good society.
Fredericka had said that he struck her as "right curious," and Felicia too had to admit that there was something striking in his manner. The idea of hastiness could not, as a general thing, be thought of in conjunction with his independent movements and extraordinarily self-contained bearing; and yet, at this moment, with the very best intentions, the young girl could not have otherwise designated his demeanor.
He was evidently most impatient to move on rapidly—a thing of impossibility, linked as he was to his mother, with her clumsy figure and measured movements—and with uplifted head, his eyes roved searchingly over the garden—no doubt he was looking for his little patient. Rosa came springing over the gravel square to get Anna, and Felicia followed the pair, until they came to the first prow of fir-trees, when she stopped to witness, unseen, the meeting between mother and child.   The young widow did, indeed, throw her arms around the little girl and pat her cheeks, but meanwhile she scolded Rosa severely for having taken away with her the key to her room, so that she had been obliged to walk through town, in that "abominable" dress.    The stylish traveling-suit had indeed suffered from the delicacy of its lovely blue color, and hung in limp folds over her crinoline, while the flounce around the skirt was draggled and frayed.
"Well, I shall always consider this excursion, from beginning to end, as one of the most unpleasant experiences of my life-time!" said the young lady, pouting ill-humoredly, while she darned a rent in the spoiled dress. "I only wish that I had stayed with you, aunt, in your quiet room! We had a thousand misadventures, I tell you; no matter in what direction we turned, there was always a hurricane at our heels; and my cousin, Mr. Isegrimm, such a terrible bad mood as he was in the whole of the time! You can form no idea, aunt, of his perfect disregard of my feelings, I and, in short, of his unamiability! He would have preferred to have us turn back the very first day, I do believe. And oh! the trouble we did take to overcome his sulkiness! But all to no purpose; we could not bring a smile to his sternly solemn face. Miss von Sternthal devoted herself so assiduously to the task of mollifying him, I expected nothing else than to have a declaration of love on the tapis! Now, I say yourself, John, was she not affability and complaisance itself?"
What the professor answered Felicia could not catch. She had already returned to her work under the nut-tree and was stitching away in the hope that nobody would trouble about her. A storm seemed to be brewing out yonder. The vivid flush of violent excitement still lingered on Mrs. Hellwig's cheeks, and her son's ill-humor as a traveling-companion seemed to have been by no means improved through the scene of reception.
For a long while it seemed as though the solitary seamstress under the nut-tree would remain unobserved in her retirement; but once her glance strayed to the hole in the evergreen hedge, and fell immediately upon the professor. He came sauntering along over the gravel square, with his hands joined behind his back. His features, however, had an excited, intent look,, quite in contrast with his negligent gait, and his eyes peered restlessly about the different paths, laid off between the carefully clipped rows of evergreens.
Felicia sat perfectly still and watched him. Involuntarily she had laid her right hand upon her throbbing heart; her spirits felt strangely oppressed, and she dreaded the moment when his glance must fall upon her. Still more slowly than before, he proceeded to the narrow gravel walk which encircled the large grass-plot.
His head was uncovered—was it the strange, unwonted expression that it bore, or had his complexion lost his vigorous tone—at any rate, to the young girl, his head seemed altered.
He caught at the bough of an apple-tree, drew it down, and apparently, with undivided interest, considered its fruit germs—at all events he did not see the young girl under the nut-tree.     The bough resumed its natural position again, and he went on his way.    Now he stood on a line with Felicia, quickly he stooped and picked up something that he found on the edge of the grass.
"Ah, look there, Felicia, a four-leaved clover!" cried he to her, without, however, looking up.     This sounded as home-like and confidential, as if his intercourse with her had never been interrupted or clouded, as though it were quite a matter of course for her to be sitting there under the nut-tree; but, at the same time, there was a commanding necessity in this address; in a certain way it chained the maiden to the spot where she now stood.   "People say that these four leaves bring happiness to the finder," continued he, as he quickly advanced across the grass.    "Well, I want to see directly how far this superstition is reliable!"
He stood before her now, and the concentrated energy of a strong-minded man was manifested in the manner of his address.    The clover-leaf fell from his hands, and he held both out to Felicia.
"Good-evening!" he said, and his voice trembled in uttering these two simple words.    Years ago he would have been justified in assuming this tone toward the nine-year-old child, who, with all the passionate yearning of an affectionate heart, craved sympathy and love; but to use this tenderly familiar style of greeting to a girl whom he had so long ill-used and misunderstood, making it so apparent that he was delighted to meet her again, was something simply incomprehensible.  Nevertheless she, the pariah, who had lately declared that she would reject his help, even in case of direst necessity,  now raised her right hand and gently laid it in his for a moment, as though impelled by some irresistible force.    It seemed, like a sort of miracle, and as such he deemed it—a single inadvertent movement might scare it away never to return again. With all the self-command that he could summon to his aid, the physician passed to another tone.
"Has Anna given you much trouble?" asked he kindly and sympathetically.
"On the contrary, the child's devotion touches me. I love to nurse her."
"But you look paler than usual, and that melancholy expression about your mouth is more strongly defined than ever. You said just now that the child's devotion touched you; other people are devoted to you, too, Felicia! I shall prove that to you directly. I wonder if you thought a single time of those who had fled from the little town of X------in order to gain strength for resistance to certain potent influences making themselves felt there?"
"I had neither time nor cause for so doing," answered she, blushing deeply, but with a frown upon her brow.
"So I presumed. But I was more philanthropical; I thought about you. You are to learn when and where. I saw a noble fir-tree standing all alone on the edge of a cliff. It looked as though it had been ill-treated and abused in the pine forest at its feet, and taken refuge on that solitary height. There she stood firm and dark, and my fancy lent her the features and expression of a well-known and proudly contemptuous human face. Then came a tempest; the rain beat upon her branches and the storm shook her pitilessly, but after every assault she straightened herself up and stood firmer than before."
Felicia opened her eyes at him half-shyly, half-defiantly. How strangely altered he had come back! The man with the cold, steel-gray eyes, the former pietist and mystic, the inbred conservative in whom every spark of poetical freedom had been stifled by arbitrary rule and regulation, this man told her with his deep voice that had done such doughty service in the cause of grave science, now told her a fairy-tale of his own invention, the significance of which she could not misunderstand.
"And only think," he continued, "there I stood in the depths of the valley, my companions scolding because the impracticable professor would expose himself to the pouring rain, when shelter was close at hand. They did not know that a vision had suddenly opened before the dry, unimaginative professor, that could not be exorcised either by cold showers of rain or the pelting of the storm.    And this was what he saw: a brave man left the forest below pealed the cliff, and, throwing his arm around the fir-tree said: 'You are mine!'    And what more happened?" 
"I know," interrupted the girl in cold, resentful tones; "the lonely one remained true to herself and trusted to her own resources."
"Even when she perceived that he would take her to his heart fondly and firmly? When she recognized that, pillowed upon that heart, she could resist the onset of every storm, that he would tenderly shield her, as the apple of this eye, his whole life long!"
The narrator had evidently identified himself, in some sort, with the fancies of his creation, for he spoke with quivering lips, and in his voice was all that resonance which had spoken so affectingly to Felicia's heart at the child's sick-bed. Now it had lost its power over her.
"The lonely one will have learned enough from experience to know that he was amusing her with a picture," replied she, hardly.    "You say yourself that she bravely defied the storm—well, then, she had properly steeled herself and needed no other prop!"
It had not escaped her that the color had gradually faded from his cheek; for a few seconds he looked pale as ashes. It almost seemed as though he would turn upon his heel and go; but approaching footsteps grew loud. He kept his station near Felicia, and calmly waited for his mother, who, leaning on her niece's arm, came up the walk that was lined with evergreens on either hand.
"Now, do not take it ill of me, John," scolded she "but how can you stand there hindering Caroline in her work, and keeping us waiting for our suppers such an unconscionable time?—do you think I like omelet as tough as whit leather?"
The younger lady let go her aunt's arm, and stepped across the grass-plot. She was far from looking as pretty as usual; her flaxen ringlets were uncurled, and hung wild and disheveled about cheeks that glowed unbecomingly while an unwholesome light flashed from the usually dove like eyes.
"I have not had a chance to thank you yet for you supervision of Anna during my absence, Caroline," said she. Her words were friendly enough, but her soft voice had a sharp twang, being set upon so high a key as to have become decidedly cutting. "But here you are sitting like a veritable hermit, under this far-off nut-tree. How was any one to find you out? Have you often played this part of the interesting recluse?" she continued. "To be sure I ought to have less difficulty in comprehending it, since I find that Anna must have been unpardonably neglected. I have already given Rosa a good scold; her hair has not had the least attention, her skin is as sunburned as if she were a little wild Indian, and I am afraid she has been overfed."
"Have you nothing further wherewith to reproach your nurse, Adele? Bethink yourself," suggested the professor, ironically; "perhaps she is to blame, too, for your child being afflicted with scrofula; or is it not possible that she had something to do with sending so many storms to hinder your course in the Thuringian forests, and spoil your temper so: who knows?"
He paused and walked off with an almost contemptuous gesture.
"Yes, it is better for you to stop there, John," wailed the young widow, struggling with a convulsive fit of weeping. "I am almost forced to conclude that you no longer know what you say to me. I did not mean to insult you, Caroline," said she, turning to the girl, "and that you may see that I cherish no spite against you, and do not mean to withdraw my confidence from you, I will ask you to watch over Anna for this one evening more. I feel very much worn out and fatigued by my journey."
"Let there be nothing of that," interposed the professor, turning back.    "The time for such sacrifice is past.    You know very well, Adele, how to profit by the strength of others.    Henceforth you will be kind enough to resume the charge of your own child."
"Good! that just suits me," called over Mrs. Hellwig. "Then the girl can set to work at weeding, this very evening; besides, that is something I can no longer ask of Henry and Fredericka—they are too old."
Like a flame of fire the blood mounted to the professor's face.  Hard as it was to decipher his enigmatical features, at this moment shame and embarrassment were plainly written there.  Never, perhaps, had there come to him so strong a consciousness as now of what was goading in the position to which he had forced this richly endowed young creature. Felicia immediately left her place under the nut-tree; she recognized those few words of Mrs. Hellwig to have the force of a command from her, to which she must yield implicit and prompt obedience, if she would not be overwhelmed with a flood of disagreeable remarks. But the professor obstructed her path.
"I believe that I have a word to put in here, too, as your guardian," said he, apparently with great calmness; "for as such I do not desire you to do such work as that." 
"That, indeed!    Why, would you set her up for show in a glass case?" asked Mrs. Hellwig, as she too planted her large foot on the grass now, and came forward with brisker step than usual. "She has been brought up exactly as you directed, exactly! Shall I have to remind you of your letters to me, in which you reiterated over and over again—yes, till I was surfeited with it—that she must and should be trained as a servant, and that she could not be disciplined too sternly and severely?"
"I have no idea of denying a single thing that was done by my express desire," answered the professor in a hollow but steady voice; "just as little can I repent of my motives: my action at that time was the result of a pure, honest conviction that I was doing what was judicious and reasonable, but I shall not be guilty of the weakness of persisting obstinately in an error when I have perceived it, just for the sake of seeming consistent; and so, I herewith declare that I think differently now, and accordingly shall act differently."
The young widow stooped as she heard these last words. She plucked a single clover blossom, which had been spared by the sickle, and tore it to atoms. But Mrs. Hellwig laughed scornfully.
"Do not make yourself ridiculous, John!" said she, frigidly. "At your age one does not go back to first principles; they should be fixed and firm as a rock, else shipwreck is made of one's whole life. For that matter, you were not alone in this thing—I stood by your side, and I should think that my life had proved sufficiently, that by the grace of God I always do what is right. It would grieve me, indeed, if the weakness of the Hellwig family should manifest itself in your character at this late day. I tell you plainly once for all, you and I would part. So long as this girl is in my house she is to do my work, and not have a minute left her for idling—and now that's enough!  Afterward, for aught I care, she may be as trifling as she pleases, play the great lady, and sit with her hands folded in her lap!"
"That she will never do, Mrs. Hellwig!" said Felicia, as, with a fleeting smile she considered her hands, beautifully formed and yet imbrowned and hardened by toil. "Work is one of the conditions of her being.    Will you be so good as to point out the bed to me, so that I may begin?" The professor, who had resumed his composure of manner while listening to his mother's lecture, turned abruptly now to Felicia, and a deeply imbittered look met her eye.
"Once more I forbid yon to do any such thing!" was his rough and decided command, given with darkly knitted eyebrows.    "And if my protest as a guardian cannot bend your indomitable pride, then, as a physician, I appeal now to your reason.    You have overexerted yourself in nursing Anna; your whole appearance proves it.   In a short while, you will have left my mother's house—it is our duty to see to it, that you, at least, carry a sound body with you, to your future sphere of life."
"Well, that is a reason that claims attention," agreed Mrs. Hellwig. Those words, "indomitable pride," had fallen like music upon the ears of one who had listened in vain for one word of censure of the girl to fall from her son's lips. "For aught that I care, she may go home now," added she; "although really I do not rightly comprehend why a bit of nursing should do her any harm. She is young, and was well fed all the time. Only think of other girls in her circumstances, John, who are compelled to work day and night, and yet have rosy cheeks for all that!"
She took the arm of the young widow and recrossed the grass-plot, supposing that her son followed; her niece, too, avoided looking back at him openly through pride and anger. In the beginning it did seem as though he meant to accompany them, but he had only taken a few steps before he turned around, and while the last vestiges of the unlucky light-blue traveling-dress were disappearing behind the nearest evergreen hedge, he slowly returned to the nut-tree.  For a few seconds he stood in silence by the side of Felicia, who was just tying under her chin the ribbon strings of her round straw hat. Suddenly he stooped and looked under the broad hat-brim which covered the girl's forehead and eyes completely. Still bitterness lay predominantly upon her features; but nevertheless when her eyes met his, all bad feeling melted away.
"You are not conscious of having grieved me sorely today, are you?" asked he, shaking his head, and speaking as tenderly as though he were addressing a child. She was silent.
"Felicia, it is not possible for me to think of you as belonging to that class of women who find a longed-for enjoyment in listening to a plea for pardon from a man's lips," said he, very gravely now, and not without an admixture of asperity.
She started up. Her white face, with its truly chaste and pure maidenly expression, crimsoned to the roots of her hair.
"Such a plea has always had something painful in it for the injured party, in my estimation," answered she, after a pause, in softer tones than she was accustomed to use in addressing him; "but from such as are invested with peculiar dignity in the regard of the world, I would not listen to it, in any terms.   Children are to ask pardon of their parents, It I cannot imagine the case reversed.    Just as little—" she was silent, while again a soft blush suffused her face.  "Just as little would you see your husband humble himself your presence," said he, quickly finishing her sentence for jar, while there was something exultant in the ring of his voice.  "But so high-minded a view of things entails consequences," continued he, after a momentary silence.  "And now,  for  once, be right  good  and  quiet,   and  consider whether it is not the duty of a woman to offer her hand helpfully to a man when he would like to atone for an error?   Stop; I want no answer now!    I already see by your eye that it would be a wholly different one from what I could desire.    I shall wait patiently;   perhaps there may yet come a time when the bad fir-tree on the cliff will not need her weapons!"
He went away. Her eye was fastened on the ground, upon the clover-leaf that had escaped from his hand, and that he had plucked as the symbol of good fortune. It lay there, prettily spreading out its four leaves, as though painted on the tufted heads of the meadow grass. Pick it up she dared not; she had nothing to do with his happiness; but she made a wide circuit around the little green prophet; she would not tread upon it either.
CHAPTER XX.
AFTER a series of fair days full of sunshine and the gladness of spring-time, this morning a leaden sky overhung the little town of X------, portentous of a rainy season; fog settled closely down upon the high tower, that, like a sort of sign for the diminutive city, rose up in the air white, round, and with a bright green cupola that put one in mind of an asparagus stalk. As seen by so somber a light, the old mansion on the market-place always resumed the dark and determined character of those times, when the pictures of freebooter ancestry still hung in its halls, and the spirit of the middle ages presided there moodily and fiercely, ere put to flight by the advance of a new era.
To day all the blinds in the front part of the great house were drawn close. The young widow visiting there was suffering from a violent nervous headache, and was generally in a dreadful taking; her chamber had been darkened and every precaution used for keeping her quiet. The woman's face, too, that appeared every morning in the year regularly, behind the asclepias bush in the window of the first floor, was not visible today. The gray sky overhead was a bad omen for the day—a day that was indeed to be one of the blackest and murkiest in that stout woman's life. It was the day for the opening of the will. Her person had been entirely overlooked in the summons to appear at the clerk's office, her two sons and the man-servant Henry alone having been mentioned, but as the representative of her absent son, Nathanael, she insisted that she must also be present.
Toward midday she crossed the market on her way back, escorted by the professor, while Henry walked at a modest distance behind. Cases of death and dangerous sickness among her relatives had never made the least impression upon the marble-like features of the stout woman; her strong mind, that would never yield, her deep piety that had always borne her tearlessly through such afflictions, had many a time been held up to weak despondent wives and mothers as a lofty model. today the little city had to behold the unwonted spectacle of a deviation of course on the part of this model of strong-mindedness and propriety. Upon the cheeks of this stately woman was a treacherous glow of inward excitement, her usually measured, solemn gait was hasty and precipitate, while it was plain to see that if the words she was pouring into the ear of the son walking silently beside her were spoken in a low tone, they were yet prompted by the violence of passion.
In spite of her headache, the young widow had remained upon the watch, behind one of the blinds, looking out for her returning relatives, for no sooner had they entered the front hall, than she came tripping down-stairs to meet them, with very pale cheeks and sunken eyes, it is true, but for all that in an extremely tasteful morning-robe, to inquire as to the result. They entered the sitting-room together.
"Come, congratulate us, Adele!" cried the stout woman, bursting into a deeply imbittered and malicious laugh. "There were two-and-forty thousand dollars in cash, and the Hellwig family, to whom it naturally belongs by every right human and divine, gets not a single cent! This will is the craziest composition imaginable, but still not a finger is to be laid upon it, and this crying injustice is to be quietly submitted, to! It may be seen now what it leads to when men go to sleep and let others impose upon them. Had I been the head of this house, such a thing as this would never have happened in the round world! I cannot understand how my poor dead husband, without the least bit of security in his pocket, could have suffered this old creature to harbor under the roof, and carry on just as she chose, without any supervision whatever!"
The professor, during this tirade, had been silently walking to and fro, with his hands behind his back. A dark cloud rested upon his countenance, and from underneath his furrowed brows flashes of indignation were darted across at his mother. Now he stood still before her.
"Who managed it so that our old aunt was banished to an attic under the roof?" asked he, gravely and emphatically. "Who strengthened the former head of the house, my father, in his prejudice against her, and who was inexorably strict in prohibiting any approach on the part of our old relation to us children? Who but you, mother? If you wanted her fortune you should have acted differently!"
"Surely you do not mean that I should have kept on good terms with her?   I, who have all my life walked in the Lord; and that wicked creature, who desecrated the Sabbath, and never lived in the true faith!—she will learn now that she is forever thrust out from the presence of the Lord.    No, no power on earth could have ever forced me to keep such company!   But she ought to have been declared incapable of directing her own affairs, and put under ward; and there were a thousand ways open to your father for effecting this."
The professor's face had turned quite pale; he cast a look of horror upon his mother, then silently picked up his hat and left the room. He had just had a glimpse of a yawning chasm. And so this stern, literal faith, this abominable Christian self-conceit, beneath which a boundless egotism might riot with a semblance of perfect justification, had for many years appeared to him as a halo encircling the head of his mother. Such was the female character that he had so long retained as the model of womanliness! He had to admit that he had once stood upon the same ground as his mother and the guide of his youth; yes, they had hardly equaled him in intolerance and strength of faith. He, too, had been a restless combatant, striving to make this party great, and seeking to win souls and bring them under the same domination as himself, in the fixed conviction that he was leading them to their eternal salvation. And that poor innocent orphan, with her little head full of clear, noble thoughts, with that proud, upright, sensitive spirit—he had seized her with a hard hand and thrust her into that cold, barren region, bereft of all sunshine! How she must have suffered, the sweet nightingale, under that raven! He drew his hand across his eyes, as though he were dizzy, slowly mounted the stairs, and shut himself up in his solitary study.
While these transactions were going on in the parlor a similar scene of excitement and indignation was being enacted in the servants' hall belonging to the Hellwig mansion.    The old cook was running up and down, her cap-strings flying, as though she were on a wild chase; but Henry stood this outburst of feminine rage as firmly as a cliff on the sea-shore dashed against by angry waves.    He wore his Sunday suit, and his face showed a strange commingling of joy, melancholy and ill-humor.,
"You must not think that I am envious, Henry, that would not be Christian-like!" cried Fredericka, "I really do not grudge it to you! Two thousand dollars!" she clapped her hands together, wrung them, and let them drop again clasped. "You have more luck than sense, Henry! Oh! goody, how I have slaved my whole life long, how diligently have I gone to church, in winter, when the cold was severest, how I have prayed to God that he would some day just make me this happy—nothing, nothing at all have I gotten by all this, and here this old codger meets with such a splendid streak of luck! Two thousand dollars! But I can tell you, Henry, it is heathenish money! This one thing I cannot get straight in my head. Can you accept this gold with a free conscience? By rights, the Old Ma'm'selle did not have a penny to give away, for it all belonged of a surety to our master's family. When you look at it in this light you are actually stealing the money, Henry. I don't know but that if I was in your place I would—"
"I'll take it—I'll take it, Fredericka; never do you mind about that!" said Henry in perfect tranquillity of soul.
The old cook ran into the kitchen, and slammed the door to after her.
The Old Ma'm'selle's will, which had evoked so violent a storm in the old mansion of her forefathers, had been deposited in the clerk's office  ten years  before this date. Drawn up by the testatrix herself after the usual introduction, it ran as follows:
"1. In the year 1633, Lutz von Hirschsprung, son of that Adrian von Hirschsprung who was murdered by Swedish soldiers, left the town of X------in order to settle elsewhere.    To this collateral line of the old Thuringian knightly race I bequeath:
"a. Thirty thousand dollars of my moneyed estate. 
"b. The gold bracelet, in the middle of which a few lines are engraved in old German text, encircled by a wreath of flowers.
"c. The Bach MS. of an operetta; it is incorporated in my collection of the autographs of famous composers, is in Portfolio No. 1, and bears the name of Gotthelf von Hirschsprung.
"I herewith request the worshipful magistrates to have immediately issued a proclamation, and to repeat it, if needful, summoning any heirs of the said collateral line, if such still exist. However, should no claimant appear in the space of a year's time, then it is my wish and will that the sum of thirty thousand dollars, besides the proceeds from the sale of the aforementioned bracelet and the MS. of the operetta also to be alienated be given in trust to the worshipful magistrates of the town of X------, and I herewith constitute the sum named as a fund for the following purpose:
"2. The interest of this well-invested capital is, annually for all time, to be divided into eight equal parts, and given to the teachers of all the public institutions of learning in X-----, and distributed in such a way that not one of these gentlemen be preferred or overlooked. Directors and professors have no claim to any share.
"I establish this relief fund in the firm belief that I am as truly contributing to the good of the community as if I were to endow some new scheme of benevolence. For as yet the office of teacher has been the step-child of the state, and the men, whose labors form a stone of strength in the edifice of the public welfare, are exposed to tormenting pecuniary cares, while through their intellectual exertions millions enrich themselves. Would that others also would direct their eyes to this shadow upon our bright progressive age, and use their influence in exalting and supporting a calling, the high significance of which is depreciated by so many!
"3. All of my silver plate and jewelry, with the exception of the bracelet above mentioned, revert to him who shall be the head of the Hellwig family when this will takes effect, as they are old family pieces which ought not to come into the possession of strangers; likewise I bequeath to the same party all that I leave behind me in the way of house-linen, wearing apparel and furniture.
"4. My collection of the autographs of famous composers, with the exception of the famous ' Bach Operetta Manuscript, is to be sold under warrant of the court. The proceeds of this sale are to be divided between my two great nephews, John and Nathanael Hellwig, as a token of I the regret I have always experienced in not being allowed to make them Christmas presents."
Other legacies followed to many poor tradespeople and the like, to the amount of twelve thousand dollars, among whom Henry was remembered in the sum of two thousand dollars, and the nurse one thousand.
Henry had acquainted Felicia with the substance of the will to the best of his ability. That the place where the Old Ma'm'selle kept her silver had not been particularly designated was a point made clear by his statement, and over this the maiden exulted. If the secret drawer were not discovered by some accident then it would still be in her power to destroy the gray box without the eye of any other mortal ever resting upon it.
"You see, Fay, my dear, I shall never recover from this while I live!" said Henry, sorrowfully (they were sitting all alone in the servants' hall). " You are not to get anything in the world, while, if the Old Ma'm'selle had only lived four-and-twenty hours longer the old will would have been overthrown, and you would have got all that money; she did love you dearly!''
Felicia smiled—and in that smile was pictured all the buoyancy of a hopeful youth that despises a struggle for filthy lucre, and laughs at anxiety for the future. "It is just as well as it is, Henry," answered she. "All the poor whom she has remembered need the money much more than I do, and aunt most assuredly had weighty reasons for disposing of her main fortune as she did, reasons which would have held good even if she had found opportunity for composing a new will."
"Yes, yes, there must have been something in connection with those Hirschsprungs that everybody does not know!" agreed Henry, thoughtfully. "The old Hirschsprung, whom I remember quite well, was a shoe-maker, and made my first pair of boots for me—a thing not to be forgotten, you know. He lived up the street, close by our house, and the gossips of the neighborhood had it that his son and the Old Ma'm'selle had become fond of each other when they played as children. Afterward the young man became a student, and was engaged to the Old Ma'm'selle —so people say. They tell, moreover—and this is what worries me most of all—that this love affair was the death of Mr. Hellwig, her father. He never could bear the idea of it; and once he got into high words with the Old Ma'm'selle, and she aggravated him so that he fell down dead upon the spot, if it is true. I do not believe it. Immediately afterward the Old Ma'm'selle went to Leipsic; there the student was ill of nervous fever, and she stayed by him and nursed him to the last. Thereupon her relations became furiously angry; they abused her as a girl of shameful character, and so would have nothing to do with her, and the townspeople took their cue from them, so when she came home not a creature called upon her, and ever after she kept entirely to herself. Be that as it will, it does strike me as curious that people should be her heirs who left the country so many, many years ago—even in that student's time, long ago as that has been, they were not counted as relations. Somebody make that clear to me."
On the following day the seals of the court were taken off the home in the attic.
Those were disagreeable days that ensued after the lifting of the seals. The uniformly gray, motionless layer of clouds in the sky seemed inexhaustible. Day and night the pattering on roof and street pavement were continual, and water-jets gushed in mighty arches from the dragon-heads on the old merchant's house, down upon the market-place. They looked grimmer than ever, those metallic, wide-open jaws on the roof; the discolored foam, which spurted up noisily from between the pavement stones looked like sheer poison and gall; for they had these many years been looking on complacently at the steady inflow of treasures into the old house that they guardianed, and of which the world got back only a tiny, well-watched-over little stream; and, now lo! an unheard-of thing had happened—a considerable fortune had departed from this house, going out into the wide, wide world, and neither the strong, stout walls, nor that woman by the asclepias bush, with her rigid features, were able to hold it back.
During these rainy days Felicia had retired to her own room, next to the servants' hall. Without doubt, by express command of the professor, she had been relieved of heavy household duties. On the other hand she sat now fairly buried in a high pile of old house linen, which she was to look over and mend, for she was not even now to eat her bread exactly as a gratuity.
Out in the yard the far-off spring babbled monotonously, and the rain fell unweariedly in regular beats, splashing upon the broad leaves of the colt's foot, that was reveling in a damp corner; occasionally the cackling of the hens and crowing of the rooster made themselves heard from the poultry-yard, but the gray tone that the faint, colorless light of the day shed upon all objects, was interrupted by the flying in of individual doves, who, sitting upon the dripping window-sills, let the rain fall full upon their brightly gleaming plumage. Light, sound, and movement, all seemed to be dulled and under pressure, and this apathy evidently extended itself to the pale girl in the bow window. It is true that her hand, thimble on finger, rose and fell indefatigably and regularly, but her glorious profile looked almost statue-like in immobility, as she bent over her work. Life, with its terrible shocks, had hitherto tried in vain to affix the stamp of suffering and resignation upon her features—they had only become even paler and paler, and the appearance was as though they would gradually stiffen into the expression of an unbroken spirit, a capability of unyielding resistance.
But under the coarse stuff that encircled that delicate figure beat a deeply disturbed heart, and while her hand I mechanically repaired many a weak place her mind was torturing itself as to the possible accomplishments of hard tasks that entailed severe conflicts. The court had in vain instituted a search for the Old Ma'm’selle's silver plate and jewelry. At first this result had had a soothing effect upon the anxiously excited feelings of the young girl; but Henry, from that moment, had gone about with a troubled face and indescribable excitement of manner. Mrs. Hellwig had remarked to the officer of the law, with a significant glance at the house-servant, that for many years only he and the nurse had gone freely in and out of the Old Ma'm'selle's abode, and upon the expression of the severe woman, which sounded very like an accusation, the honest fellow had, without further ceremony, been called before the court, and subjected to a most humiliating examination. He was beside himself. "What torture for Felicia, to be obliged to witness the bitter distress of this trusty old friend, without daring to drop a hint, even of the secret she had in keeping! Calm and composed as Henry had otherwise proved himself in all the affairs of life, he seemed to be perfectly unnerved by having such a suspicion to attach to him, and the young girl dreaded, with reason, lest, under the irresistible impulse to rid himself of so abominable an accusation, he should be hasty and imprudent, and the utmost circumspection and self-control were the more imperatively required at her hands, in order to keep the Old Ma'm'selle's secret.
It was doubly hard now to gain access to the apartments in the attic. On the day when the seals were removed the professor had been in the highest degree surprised by a survey that he made of his mysterious old aunt's suite of rooms, and then he had forthwith taken possession of them as head of the house. Possibly, when he obtained a view of the original and tasteful arrangement of her rooms a light had suddenly broken in upon him as to the spirit and disposition of her who had been banished into solitude. Not a piece of furniture was to be stirred from its place, and he had been made quite indignant by the young widow's having removed a needle from the pin-cushion before his eyes.
It seemed as though he meant to pass the remainder of his sojourn under his mother's roof in that unique abode. He only came down-stairs at meal-times, and then always "with a sour face," as Fredericka said. But the young widow, too, had been seized with a sort of passion for "that charming little retreat," and begged as a special favor of her cousin to be allowed to visit the attic often, Rosa must polish up the floors, and, with her own delicate little hands, she would dust off the furniture. Aunt Cordelia's rooms, therefore, were never left unguarded; besides, the professor had caused the old-fashioned, clumsy lock on the painted door to be taken off, and its place supplied by another, so that Felicia's key had become perfectly useless. She was now reduced to attempting the way over the roofs.
At the thought of being forced, like a skulking wrong- doer to penetrate into locked places, she always shook from horror and excitement; this spying out for the first unguarded moment, when the unsuspecting inmates should absent themselves, was utterly revolting to her soul. Nevertheless, she kept her aim steadily in view, and a keen thrill of anguish would dart through her whenever it occurred to her that the time which remained for the performance of her task had already narrowed into two weeks.
Finally the rain was over.    A patch of clear blue sky overhung the square court-yard; the colt's foot dried its thoroughly well-washed leaves in a strong draught of fresh air; in and out busily flew the swallows who had built their nests on the roof and window cornices of the building, and their little blue backs fairly sparkled in the warm, new sunlight. A day like this lured one into the open air. Probably they would dine out in the garden today, and then—the road across the roofs was free. This hope of Felicia's, however, was not gratified. Immediately after dinner, Rosa came to the bow-window and brought her a message that she must go into the garden with Anna, because the professor had procured the child this gratification. Later the rest of the family would follow and take their supper out there.
There went Felicia, now, holding little Anna by the hand, "under orders," pacing through the lonely garden. Instead of the roof-tiles or plank floor of the airy gallery, she had beneath her feet the gravel of the sunny garden walks.  During the rain thousands of roses had burst into bloom.  On the elegantly trimmed circles in the front yard stood tall mallow-roses, swinging their dark velvet leaves in a lofty unapproachable way above the humble grapes at their feet, as a king arrayed in purple looks down upon the people; but in the vegetable garden the low bushes of hundred-leaved roses were not so proud, rocking their rich full cups, with their sweet, pink lips in close proximity to the thick-headed kohlrabi, and flinging forth their delicious fragrance in juxtaposition with the strong but vulgar odor of the dill and garlic. Unobservantly, with bowed head, Felicia passed by the beauties on either hand, and the good-humored child tottered clumsily along at her side, keeping her little mouth tightly closed lest her talking might disturb the meditations of her kind young friend.  She thought, with a sort of wild, burning pain, of the time when last year's roses had been in bloom—how differently they had looked and smelled, when Aunt Cordelia's clear, loving eyes had been there to smile upon them. Ah! how delightful had been those quiet summer afternoons, when they would sit together upon the balcony, the one reading aloud from some classical author, in a voice expressive of deep feeling, while her devoted pupil would listen in silent enjoyment. From the balcony were wafted in the sweetest perfumes, and far into the distance stretched away the green vales of Thuringia. A sweet home feeling had there infused itself into the young girl's soul, for she had known that she was ever welcome in that peaceful, cozy retreat, protected and guided by a love that was truly maternal in its nature; if only for a few hours at a time, she had been free there in her movements and utterances of thought and feeling. No wonder, then, that the roses had looked and smelled sweeter, and the world been more sunny.
She lifted up her head, and looked over the hedge into the neighboring garden. She caught a peep of Mrs. Francke's pretty little white cap. The old lady and her son were sitting at the tea-table, he reading aloud, while she, leaning comfortably back in her arm-chair, made her knitting-needles flash as they flew through her fingers. This, too, looked pleasant and home-like. Felicia said to herself, that under the guardianship of those people she would be free, to a certain degree, that she must make intellectual progress through intercourse with them, who were so humane and highly cultured, that in no case would she be in her new relations the automaton who had to go when ordered and move her hands, while eyes and lips dared not betray the existence of an active, independent spirit.
In spite of this thought she did not become more cheerful.    Even before Aunt Cordelia's death, she had felt a certain weight resting upon her spirit, indefinable to herself—a dimly felt trouble, that, upon closer inspection, vanished like a phantom; of only one thing she was certain; this feeling associated itself with the presence of her former tormentor.    She had been well convinced before his arrival that his personal appearance would intensify her bitter resentment, but that these feelings would react so powerfully, and in almost enigmatical manner, upon all the sensibilities of her being, she had not by any means expected.
Now and then the elevated voice of the reader penetrated through the hedge; there was much that was agreeable in those tones, but they did not possess the magnetism which pertained so strikingly now to the modulation of the professor's voice, once upon a time so monotonous as its utterances had been. Felicia indignantly shook her head and tossed it back—what had made that comparison occur to her? She forced her thoughts immediately into another channel, upon a subject that concerned her nearly, and which had often occupied her mind since the opening of the will.  The court had appointed the young lawyer Francke as council for the Hirschsprung heirs, supposing that they existed. A summons had been in the newspapers for two days already, and Felicia awaited the result in almost passionate suspense—most likely it would bring her keen pain. Should the Hirschsprung family appear in answer to this summons that promised them a rich inheritance, this would confirm the supposition that the actor's wife had been disowned. But what sort of people could they be, in whose eyes the shortcomings of a member of their family had not been expiated by so shockingly tragic a fate?
Felicia therefore linked not a single hopeful thought to the probable appearance upon the scenes of new relations. She would withdraw from his face the curtain of concealment, however her heart throbbed at the bare idea of someday meeting her cruel grandparents, wholly unsuspicious as they would be of their silent grandchild's presence.
The Aulic councilor's wife, Mrs. Francke, had caught sight of Felicia across the hedge. She arose and came forward, attended by her son. The two greeted the young girl very cordially, and the lawyer expressed his pleasure in the prospect of having daily intercourse with her as a member of his mother's family. From this he entered, easily and without constraint, into a long conversation. An unwonted diffidence came over this polished man of the world, in presence of this earnest young girl, who looked so calmly and unconcernedly into his eyes, and gave expression to such fresh, original thoughts in so remarkably clear and unaffected a manner. They conversed long and searchingly, the conversation touching upon topics of the most varied nature. At last Mrs. Francke made inquiries after Anna's health. Felicia picked the child up, and with a glad smile pointed to the ruddy hue of her cheeks, that awhile ago had been so sallow.
On parting, the old lady held out her hand to Felicia; her son, too, stretched out his right hand across the hedge, and the young girl laid hers in it, kindly and without constraint. At that instant the garden-gate clicked, and the professor crossed its threshold. He stood still for a few seconds, as though rooted to the spot, then slowly put his hand to his hat and bowed to the group. Felicia saw that his face was suddenly suffused with red. The lawyer opened his lips to address him, but he turned his head quickly away in the opposite direction, and went into the summer-house.
"Well, to be sure, that salutation was worthy of an absent-minded professor!" said young Francke, laughingly to his mother. "That good John has evidently some unlucky patient in mind, upon whom he has to exert his surgical skill, and at such times he does not recognize his best friends."
Mother and son returned to their tea-table, and Felicia sought shade and security from observation in the orchard. 
CHAPTEE XXI.
THE giant screen composed of the fir-trees formed an excellent protection against the sun, the wind which had been lately blowing right violently over the broad gravel square, and against angry looks, that, perchance, might be leveled at her from the summer-house. Felicia knew the professor's countenance much too well not to know that just now he had been vexed and out of humor, but not absent-minded; she even thought that she could guess the source of his annoyance. He was especially particular in exacting implicit obedience to his orders as a physician, and after all that Rosa had told, concerning his practice at Bonn, he must be accustomed to having his wishes scrupulously regarded. He had several times, and at last even with great impatience, prohibited her lifting Anna, and just now he had once more seen her disregard his prohibition. Thus only could she explain that look, full of angry surprise, which he had cast upon her on entering the garden.
Felicia seated herself on a bank of the remote dam. A solitary weeping-willow here lifted up its slight white stem, letting its elastic branches hang over the bank in true arbor-like style. The wind passed imperceptibly by this protected spot; often the grapes trembled, as though drawing in a deep breath and the willow-boughs shook gently. But the mill-stream, mightily swollen by the recent rains, shot furiously past—a gurgling, turbid mass of waters, that tore along and dashed trickishly by the hazel-hushes on the shore.
With unskillful fingers the child plucked meadow-flowers, and the poor things, pulled off for the most part close to the calyx, must be made up by Felicia into a short-stemmed bouquet for "Uncle Professor."  This tiresome occupation required patience and attention;   so Felicia fastened her eyes undeviatingly upon the bouquet forming in her hands; she did not see the professor, therefore, emerge from the evergreen walk, and advance rapidly toward her.    An exclamation from Anna made her look up, at last, but he was already close beside her.    She made an effort to rise, but he gently seized her arm, and pressed her back into her seat upon the bank—then, without further ceremony, took his place at her side.
It happened, for the first time, that she utterly lost her presence of mind, for a moment.  Four weeks ago, she I would have decidedly repelled his hand, and withdrawn, full of abhorrence. Now she sat there, as if paralyzed, powerless, as though under a spell of some enchanter. It vexed her that, of late, he had been assuming so easy and familiar a tone in addressing her; she desired nothing more ardently than to convince him that she hated and despised him as cordially as ever; but suddenly she found neither courage nor words wherewith to express this. Her shy glance skimmed his features. She saw anything but anger and displeasure there, and that strange flush had passed away from them. Felicia found fault with herself, because this homely face, by its strength and determination, could make an impression upon her against her will.
He sat by her for a few seconds without speaking a word. Meanwhile she felt, rather than saw, that his eyes were riveted upon her.
"Do me the favor, Felicia, to take that abominable thing off your head," said he, finally breaking silence in a tone that was quiet and almost cheerful; then, without waiting to ascertain the young girl's mood, he lightly seized the brim of her hat, and slung this certainly very ugly, worn-out specimen of its kind contemptuously on the sod. A sunbeam that, gliding through the flexible willow boughs, had been hitherto playing over the black straw hat, now rested upon the chestnut-brown hair of the maiden—a loose tress glimmered like spun gold.
''So. Now I can see what wicked thoughts are at work in that brain of yours!" said he, with a faint attempt at a smile. "I shrink from a battle in the dark. I like to see whom I am fighting, and here"—he pointed at her forehead—"I know that I have to do with an adversary hard to conquer."
To what could he mean this queer introduction to lead? Perhaps he expected her to make some reply, but she remained persistently silent. Her fingers huddled together indiscriminately all the buttercups, daisies, and blades of grass that the child seemed never to be weary of bringing her.    Those little hands there, that never gave up a task that they had once begun, had, during many days' confinement to the house, lost a great deal of their brown color, and now looked almost rosy.  The professor suddenly caught hold of her right hand and examined its palm—here there were indeed traces of labor not so easy to be removed, for the skin was covered by a hard induration.    The girl who had been brought up to work by the express command of her inexorable guardian, that she might be prepared for domestic servitude, had bravely fitted herself for this station in life; this was a thing not to be denied.    Although a deep color mounted to Felicia's face upon being subjected to this scrutiny, at the same instant she recovered all her early composure and self-command.    For, upon very sensitively constituted natures, the examination of the palm of one's hand produces almost the same impression as when the features of the- face are subjected to a searching gaze. With a quiet turn of the head she looked up, and he slowly let her hand drop; then he rubbed his forehead several times as though he were trying to find expression for some difficult thought.
"You enjoyed going to school, did you not?" he asked suddenly. "You delight in intellectual occupations?"
"Yes," answered she, in surprise. The question sounded peculiar—she was plainly of mean extraction. Properly, diplomatic expedients were a thing apart from this man's nature, independently of his usually having a great fund of language at his command.
"Well, then," continued he, "you have undoubtedly made up your mind on a question that I gave you to consider lately?"
"I have."
"And of course have come to the conclusion that it is the duty of a woman to stand by a man faithfully when he would like to atone for an error committed?" He rested his hand upon his knee, stooped down, and looked intently upon her face.
"Not so unconditionally as that," replied she, firmly while she let the hand with the bouquet in it fall into her lap, and looked the questioner full in the face. "I must first know wherein the sin consists."
"Subterfuges," he murmured, and his face darkened perceptibly. He seemed to forget that he had hitherto spoken in general terms, and added, with considerable excitement of manner, "You need not treat one so abominably. I assure you that your expression of face at this moment is quite enough to deter one from making you a very monstrous proposition. The question is simply this—be your mysterious plans of life whatsoever they may—will you remain under my guardianship another year, and devote this time solely to your mental culture? Let me finish my speech!" continued he, with elevated voice and knitted eyebrows, as she tried to interrupt him. "For once look away from the fact that it is I who make you this proposal, and consider that I am only carrying out my father purpose, and acting in accordance with express direction left by him in thus caring for your higher culture!"
"It is much too late for this."
"Too late?   Young as you are?"
"You misunderstand me.     I mean by this, that as helpless and irresponsible child, I was forced to accept alms good or bad; there was no help for it.    I was obliged to submit.    Now, I stand upon different footing.  I can work and never mean to accept another penny that I do not earn."
The professor bit his lips, and his eyelashes were lowered until the orbs below were hardly discernible.
"I foresaw this objection," answered be, coldly, "for am fundamentally acquainted with your indomitable pride. My plan is this: you are to attend an institution of learning. I shall lend you the needful means, and afterward when you become independent, you can repay me to the last farthing. I know an admirable school for young ladies at Bonn, being family physician to its very worthy principal. You would be finely taught there, and"—he added with a voice slightly vibrating—"our separation, never to meet again, would then be postponed for a little while. In fourteen days my vacation will expire, and I shall return to Bonn, taking my cousin under my escort, and if you follow my plan, you will, of course, accompany us. Felicia, not long ago I begged you to be forgiving and reasonable, let me now repeat that request. Do not listen to the whisperings of your sense of injury; forget, if only for a few minutes, the past, and allow me to make up for what has been postponed so long?"
She had listened to him in perturbation.    As of late, in the narration of his so-called vision, there was something irresistibly persuasive in his voice.    He was not so inexplicably excited as he had been that time, but his true and genuinely meant repentance, although revealed without at all derogating from his manly dignity, had so much of mild earnestness in it that she was captivated by it in spite of herself.
"If I had control over my own movements in the near future, I would cheerfully and candidly accept your offer," said she, more softly than she had ever spoken to him before; "but I am bound.    On the very day I leave Mrs. Hellwig's house I enter another service."
"Is this irrevocably settled?"
"Yes; my word once given I hold sacred, and I neither swerve from nor explain it away, although its consequences  should entail ever so much that was disagreeable."
He stood up, with a quick movement, and stepped beyond the reach of the willow-tree.
"And may a person not learn now what you have in view?" asked he, without looking toward her again.
"Oh, yes!" she answered, with composure; "Mrs. Hellwig should have known about it before this if I had had any opportunity of approaching her. The Aulic councilor's wife, Mrs. Francke, has engaged me as her companion."
These few last words had the effect of a sudden clap of thunder. The professor turned himself about abruptly, and a dark glow suffused his countenance.
"The lady over there?" he asked, as though he did not trust his own ears, and stretching out his hand toward the adjoining garden. He quickly returned to the shelter of the tree. "Put that out of your mind as speedily as possible," said he decidedly and dictatorially; "to that I shall never give my consent."
Now the young girl arose with a gesture of indignation, letting the flowers which had been collected so laboriously fall heedlessly upon the grass.    "Your consent?" asked she, proudly.   "I do not need it!   In fourteen days I shall be my own mistress, and can go wherever I please."
"The matter stands differently now, Felicia," replied he, very dogmatically.    "I have more right over you than you suppose.    Years may elapse ere these rights expire, and then, too—yes, then, too, the question is whether I shall resign them."
"We shall see about that!" said she, coldly, with determined air.
"Yes, we shall see! I spoke yesterday with Dr. Bohm, my father's oldest and most intimate friend, in relation to his knowledge of the terms upon which you became an inmate of my father's family, and I obtained from him positive information as follows: You were intrusted to my father upon the express condition that he would keep you under his roof until you were either claimed by your own father, or another suitable protector should be found, who should give you his name. In case of his death, my father, in writing, appointed me his representative in this affair, and I am determined to adhere to the condition imposed."
Now the young girl was entirely thrown off her balance. 
"Good heavens!" cried she, beside herself, and clasping her hands together. "Is there to be no end to this misery? Am I to be forced to live longer in this state of dependence? For years has my courage been kept up by this one hope, that in my eighteenth year I should be released! Only in the strength of this thought have I been able to appear calm and submissive, while inwardly I was suffering tortures! No, no, I am no longer the patient creature that allows herself to be trampled upon and degraded out of respect to the dead! I will not! I will not have anything more to do with the Hellwigs. I shall burst these hateful bonds, no matter at what cost!"
The professor seized both her hands; at her last words he had turned deadly pale.
"Compose yourself, Felicia!" said the professor, with a voice that was soothing but at the same time well-nigh stifled. "Do not rage to your own hurt, like a poor little imprisoned bird that would rather beat itself to death than submit to the inevitable—'hateful bonds.' Does it not occur to you that you grieve me unspeakably by your hard, reckless words? You are to be free, perfectly free in thought and action, only shielded and protected as a tenderly loved child. Felicia, you are to learn to know now how it is when love thinks and cares for us. Only this one time more shall I assert my authority as guardian; do not make the needful steps hard for me by your resistance, which will avail you nothing—I solemnly declare. I shall take this matter into my own hands and cancel your engagement with Mrs. Francke."
"Do so," gasped Felicia, almost hoarsely, while the last drop of blood seemed to forsake her face; "but I, too, shall act, and you may be sure that I shall struggle to the last gasp!"
Never in her brief, sorely tried life had such a tempest raged in her soul as at this instant. New, unknown voices made themselves heard, taking part mightily in this tumult; it seemed as though they were the echo of his fervent words of entreaty. Like a dark storm-cloud a frightful danger hung over her head, and—this she felt instinctively—she must burst away from it, at any price, unless she should fall hopelessly into the snare that threatened. Was it not even now, as though he had acquired an incomprehensible control over her whole being, as though every bard word that she addressed to him rebounded painfully against her own heart.
He had all this time retained her hands within his own, and while she spoke his glance rested searchingly upon her features, that, for an instant, recklessly mirrored the passionately excited soul of the distracted girl.
Processes of the human soul had been compelled to lay bare their secrets before the eyes of this astute surgeon and student of metaphysics, much more difficult to read than the feelings which were stirring within the breast of this young creature, who was the more unguarded because of her very purity and guiltlessness.
"You will do nothing!" said he, suddenly tranqnilized, with a composure that was almost cheerful. *'My eyes are open and my arm reaches right far. You are not going to escape me, Felicia! I shall not leave you here in X-----, at any rate, and just as little will I go back to Bonn without you."
The garden gate had creaked a long time ago, but the noise had escaped the speakers. Now Rosa came up, bringing the professor word that Mrs. Hellwig was waiting for him in the parlor, and that her young mistress also begged him to hurry thither.
"Is she unwell?"  asked the professor, curtly, without turning toward the waiting-maid.
"No," replied she, in amazement, "but the lady, your mother, will soon have the coffee ready, which she is making with her own  hands, and she is very anxious for the professor to drink some when it is right fresh and hot. Mr. Francke is in the parlor, too."
"Very well, I'll come," said the professor, but he made no preparation for starting. Perhaps he hoped that Rosa would absent herself, but in this he was mistaken. The girl busied herself with Anna, who was wringing her little hands in dismay, and crying at the sight of all her pretty flowers lying trodden there upon the grass. Finally, he went down the dam in discontented fashion.
"Do not stay here so long," he called back to Felicia. "The wind blows stronger, and possibly threatens us with a storm. Come on with Anna to the summer-house."
He vanished behind the evergreen hedge.  But Felicia hastily traversed the whole length of the dam. In her usually clear head ideas were now whirling in chaotic disorder. She struggled in vain for the needful coolness and self-possession to enable her to survey and master her present situation. So she must e'en come under the yoke again, and it was not enough that any independence was withheld from her for another long season, but she was even to live in his immediate neighborhood, to have daily intercourse with him for a whole year; as if this were not the hardest task that could have been appointed her! Had she not done everything to prove to him that she hated him with her whole soul, and would never be reconciled to him so long as she lived No! a thousand times rather would she suffer ill treatment at Mrs. Hell-wig's hands for years to come than stay with him one single minute longer, who exercised over her a really demoniacal force. Already the very sound of his voice could bewilder the ordinarily well-regulated tenor of her thoughts. That indescribably mild and warm tone, which now he always used in speaking to her, thrilled every fiber of her heart, and made it beat quicker; of course, this was the old hatred asserting itself so fiercely, but she must not give way to such fearfully exciting and long-cherished feelings, for, in the end, they would ruin her physically and morally. That vision which he had lately described to her had given her much to think about; now the only possible explanation she had been able to give of it had been confirmed by these words: "Felicia, you are to learn to know, now, how it is when love thinks and cares for us!"
At all events, he designed, in spite of her decided declaration of her purpose to decide in all such personal matters, to dispose of her hand hereafter in a manner to suit himself—she was to be bound some day to a man of his selection—was it thus that he meant to provide for her, and make good the injustice done her, which he had certainly admitted?—her heart revolted at this idea. How presumptuous and immoral was such a view! Could he force some man to love her? He himself had an unhappy passion, and hence was going solitary through life; by this resolution he claimed great rights for his own heart—it was to decide the fate of his whole future. He should see that she too meant to claim precisely the same privilege for herself—that she was not to be dealt with as merchandise. What restrained her from going immediately to Mrs. Francke and placing herself under her protection? Ah! there was the little gray casket that chained her more firmly to that unhappy house than any human will could have done—for its sake she must tarry up to the last minute.
CHAPTER XXII.
ANNA interrupted the puzzling and torturing exercises of the young girl's mind. She took Felicia's hand affectionately, and led her down to the dam. The wind was already whistling with great force through the tops of the apple-trees, and by fits and starts invaded fiercely more protected places; terrified, the timid little field flowers bent their heads before this disturber of the peace.
Heaps of cloud chased each other over the face of the sun, whose shadows like giant-wings stretched over gravel and grass-plots; for the time being rose-leaves whirled high in the air, and even the stiff pyramidal fir-trees nodded slowly and solemnly like old court dames.
Comfort, then, was to be sought within-doors. Felicia took her seat on a rustic chair in the front hall, and drew out her sewing.    The door of the little kitchen, as well as that to the parlor, stood wide open.    It would not be easy to imagine a more graceful picture than that presented by the young widow,   as she played the part of housewife. She had on a richly trimmed black silk apron, finished off with a becoming bodice, and among her fair ringlets, close to her ear, nestled a crimson rose; it had evidently been plucked in passing, and placed there in a self-forgetfulness that had a charming effect.    Under the skirt, caught up in festoons, shod in cinnamon-colored boots, her little feet moved  about with child-like nimbleness and  grace;  the present expression too of the rosy face was that of the happy, innocent child, who discharged the duty assigned it with zeal and an air of importance.    Who could have associated with this perfect embodiment of childish naivette the designation "mother and widow "?
While she presided at the coffee-urn a lively conversation was in progress between Mrs. Hellwig and young Mr. Francke. It turned upon the Old Ma'm'selle's last will. Henry and Fredericka had already made the young girl aware that "the madame" could neither think nor speak of anything unconnected with that unlucky will. Felicia turned her eyes for a moment upon the face of that stout woman, and it struck her as strangely aged and altered; there was also an unwonted haste in her ways and manner of speech—wrath and resentment had evidently gotten the upper hand in the arid soul of this fanatical woman.
The professor took no part in this conversation; indeed, it seemed as though he were perfectly deaf to it. With hands crossed behind his back, as though lost in deep thought, he paced ceaselessly up and down the whole length of the parlor floor, only, every time that he passed the open door a quick glance fell upon the girl who was sewing in the hall outside.
"I shall never be satisfied again while I live, my dear Francke!" repeated Mrs. Hellwig. "As if every penny of it had not been hardly earned by the Hellwigs! But now here comes perhaps some ruined spendthrift and makes merry over the savings of an honorable house—and to think of what a source of blessing this money might have proved in our hands!"
"But, auntie," said the young widow, sweetly, who had just come in with a pot of steaming hot coffee and was filling the cups, "there you are again immersed in that vexatious business that evidently excites you so much. You will make yourself sick, I am afraid. Think of your children and me, too, auntie; for our sakes try to forget!"
"Forget!" cried Mrs. Hellwig, passionately. "Never! I have some character, I thank you, a thing increasingly rare, alas! in the rising generation!"—a withering glance was here directed toward her perambulating son. ''The pangs of a wrong suffered strike through and through me —I cannot treat them lightly. How can you come to me with such commonplace phrases! You are often wretchedly superficial, Adele!"
Her niece colored, a bitterly resentful feeling showed itself in the lines of the month, and the cup which she was offering to Mrs. Hellwig clattered in her hands;  but she was sufficiently mistress of herself to suppress the sharp retort that was unmistakably upon the tip of her tongue.
"I certainly do not quite deserve that reproach," said she very softly, after an instantaneous silence. "No one can take that abomination more to heart than I do. Not only because I bewail the pecuniary loss, dear aunt, for yourself and my two cousins—to a truly feminine mind it must be always acutely painful to come in contact with moral depravity. There has that malignant old creature been sitting up there under the roof, spending half her life meditating as to how she could best wound her nearest relation to the quick. She has gone out of this world unreconciled with God and man, and a long list of sins upon her soul that must forever shut her out of heaven—horrible! Dear John, may I give you a cup of coffee?"
"Thanks," answered the professor, briefly, at the same time continuing his walk.
Felicia had dropped her work. She listened breathlessly to the words of that slanderous mouth. Well did she know, through Henry, that the world judged the Old Ma'm'selle harshly and censoriously; but it happened, for the first time, that she had herself become an ear-witness to such an accusation. How the hot blood rushed to her temples! Each word struck to her heart with the sharpness of a dagger—she suffered such pain for the dead now, as had not been caused her even by the agony of parting itself!
"How far the old lady may have sinned I know not," asserted the lawyer.  "Although, so far as I can learn, no one can bring any positive proof against her—the gossips of our good town are content with dark surmises. The drawing up of her will on the contrary proves indubitably that she was a woman of remarkable originality and clearness of mind."
Mrs. Hellwig laughed scornfully, and contemptuously turned her back upon him who had so boldly taken up the cudgels of defense.
"My dear young sir, it is the office of your calling to wash white the blackest transactions, and to discover angelic innocence where all the world has already passed just sentence of condemnation—your opinion is to be judged from that standpoint," said the younger lady, with indescribable malice. "I know something that—pardon me—has a hundred-fold more weight with me—my papa knew her. Through her unparalleled stubbornness, she literally worried her own father to death. Moreover, how recklessly indifferent she was as to her own reputation, is proved by her scandalous stay at Leipsic, and that uncommon intellect, as you call it, led her into abominable errors—she was a free-thinker, an atheist."
At this instant Felicia sprung to her feet, and stood on the threshold of the parlor-door. With right hand extended commandingly, her usually pale face glowing, she stood there, beautiful and wrathful as an avenging angel. The rosy lips that had so inconsiderately and with such incredible assurance uttered such frightful accusations were involuntarily silenced before the apparition.
"An atheist she never was!" said the young girl positively, and her flashing eyes were fastened upon the face of the slanderer. "A free-thinker she was, if it be called so to study the welfare of one's soul according to the light of one's own conscience. She fearlessly studied God in the works of His own creation, for there, she knew, that every path leads up to Him. The conflict between the Bible and natural science presented no difficulty to her mind, nor led her astray. Her conviction was grounded not in the letter of the law, but in the creation of God Himself, in her own existence, and the heavenly gift of thought as displayed in the workings of the immortal human spirit. She did not, like thousands of others, go to church in order to worship God in elegant clothes; but when the bells rang she humbled herself in silence before the Most High, and I suspect that her worship was more acceptable to the Searcher of Hearts than that of those who call hourly upon His name, and with the same lips slander their neighbors!"
Young Francke had unconsciously risen; he rested his hand on the back of a chair and gazed at the courageous girl, as though he hardly believed the evidence of his own senses.
"So you knew that mysterious lady?" asked he with bated breath, when Felicia had ceased to speak.
"I had daily intercourse with her."
"These are charming novelties!" said the pretty widow. This remark was meant to sound ironically; but the lady's voice had lost considerably in steadiness, and a striking pallor for a moment covered her beautiful face. "Then undoubtedly you have many a piquant tale to tell of the past in the ears of your honorable acquaintance?" asked she with an air of studied indifference, while her hand played with the coffee-spoon.
"The lady never spoke with me concerning her past life," returned Felicia quietly. She knew that she had challenged a fearful storm—the thing to do now was to meet it collectedly and calmly.
"What a pity!" commiserated the young widow, ironically wagging her curly head—but it was observable that the bloom had already returned to her cheeks. "As for the rest, I can but admire your admirable talent for acting, Caroline! You managed to mask these secret meetings admirably. You, too, dear John, I suppose, are repenting of your supposed false judgment of this character?"
The professor had stood still, in surprise, when the young girl appeared within the door-way. The words of her defense, sharp, scathing and yet eloquent, had fairly poured from her lips—that clear, logical mind, which had evidently not lacked for culture, was never at fault for prompt and telling expression. The last stinging question of his fair cousin remained unanswered. The professor's looks were fastened upon Felicia—she smiled, when he saw her flinch from those pin-pricks, in spite of all her self-control.
"Was that your real secret?" asked he of her.
"Yes," answered the young girl, and her dark eyes brightened. Strangely enough, at the sound of that voice, there came to her a sudden conviction that she would not stand alone in the inevitable conflict.
"You wanted to live altogether with your old aunt, and that was the happiness to which you were looking forward, was it?" he asked further.
"Yes."
If the young widow had not been too busily engaged in unmasking the hypocrite, she must have been shocked by the radiance that suddenly shone in the professor's eyes and illuminated his deeply serious face in a manner never before witnessed.
Question and answer had hitherto followed one another with lightning-like rapidity, and left Mrs. Hellwig no time to recover from her surprise. Rigid as a marble statue she sat back in her chair; the stocking that she was knitting slipped from her hands, and the snow-white ball rolled unheeded out into the middle of the floor.
"This is a highly interesting discovery for me!" cried the lawyer, while he quickly approached Felicia. "Fear not that I shall endeavor to penetrate into the personal secrets of the deceased. Far be such a thing from me! But perhaps you are in a situation to relieve my mind with regard to some incomprehensible gaps in the property."
Good heavens! she was to be examined as to the silver missing! She felt her whole frame tremble and her fact became perfectly blanched, her eyes were cast down in confusion; and at this minute she would have stood for a picture of guilt.
"As a passionate friend of music and autograph-collector I have been in no little excitement," continued the lawyer after he had delayed a moment, being struck by the remarkable change in the maiden's expression. "The will mentions expressly a collection of autographs of the famous composers—hitherto we have sought for them in vain. It is maintained by many, that the deceased suffered from some hallucination of the brain, and accordingly that this part of her bequest is a myth—a chimera. Have you ever seen such a collection in the old lady's possession?"
"Yes," said Felicia, drawing a deep breath of relief, but at the same time deeply imbittered by this assertion. "I was familiar with every page of it." 
"Was it a rich one?"
"It embraced principally all the names of the last century."
"An opera by Bach—I deem this designation an error —is several times mentioned in the will; can you not come somewhere near the title of this work?" said the lawyer, continuing his examination in the utmost suspense.
"Oh, yes," answered the young girl promptly. "The deceased did not err in this. It was an operetta. John Sebastian Bach composed it for the town of X------, and it was performed there in the old town-hall. Its title was: 'The Wisdom of the Magistracy in Establishing Breweries.’" 
"It is not possible!'' cried the young man, starting back in the excess of his astonishment.  "Did this composition really exist, when the whole musical world regarded the report of it as a sort of myth?"
"It was even Bach's own score, written with his own hand," continued Felicia. "He had given it to a certain Gotthelf von Hisrchsprung, and by inheritance it afterward fell into the hands of the deceased."
"These are priceless revelations! And now I beseech you to tell me where this collection is to be found?"
Now she stood suddenly on the verge of a precipice. Indignant at this imputation upon Aunt Cordelia's soundness of reason, she had sacrificed everything in resistance to the abominable slander. In her zeal as a defender, it had not occurred to her whither her bringing of proofs must lead her. Now she must answer this question directly—should she lie outright? That was an impossibility!
"I know this much, that it no longer exists," said she in a lower tone than she had hitherto used.
"It exists no longer? Do you mean to say by that that it is not, at present, in the collection?"
Felicia was silent. She wished herself miles away from this eager inquisitor.
"Or," continued he, in alarm, "could it be that it has been destroyed? If so, you must explain to me how this can have happened."
Here was a painful situation. There sat the woman who would be compromised if she were to speak out. How often, in moments of passionate excitement, had a hateful longing for vengeance against her tormentors come over her! She had then thought that it would be sweet, some day, to see this perverse woman suffer. Now such a moment was at hand—she could disgrace the proud woman by convicting her of an illegal act. How little had slit herself known of the nobility of her nature—she was perfectly incapable of revenging herself! She cast a stolen glance across at her enemy, which was met by a tiger-like look that was not to be misunderstood—it did not bewilder her.
"I was not present when the collection was destroyed and therefore cannot give any testimony in the matter," affirmed she so decidedly that they were forced to the conclusion that no information on this point was attainable through her. This manner of action, however, was to cost her dear, for now the tempest burst over her head that had hitherto been grumbling in the distance. Mrs. Hellwig had risen to her feet, and resting both hands on the table her eyes had a real demoniacal look as they glowed like coals of fire in a face that was of a leaden, ashen hue.
"Wretched creature, do you believe that you need spare me?" cried she in a voice trembling from rage. "Do you think that I had reasons for wishing to conceal one of my actions from the eyes of the world, and you must play the hypocrite for my sake, you!''
She turned her head contemptuously away, and with full resumption of her coldness and proud self-conceit, she turned to the lawyer. "For my part, I am accustomed to render an account of my actions only to the Lord, my God," said she. "What I do, is done in His name, for His glory and the purification of His Holy Church. Be nevertheless, you shall learn, my dear Francke, what became of those priceless papers, merely because I would not leave that person there under the impression, even for moment, that I had anything in common with her. The deceased Cordelia Hellwig was an atheist, a lost soul—he who defends her only proves that he is going the same road. Instead of praying for the peace that she had lost, she deadened the voice of her conscience with the poison of worldly music full of the sensuality of this life. Even on Sunday she desecrated my quiet house with her sinful carryings on. For days at a time would she sit before those unholy books, and the more she grew absorbed in then the more stiff-necked and inaccessible she became to my efforts for her salvation. Since that time I have known no livelier wish than to purify the earth of those good-for-nothing inventions of men, in which God has no share, and which lead souls astray from the path of salvation. I burned those papers, my dear Francke."
These last words she spoke with elevated voice and an air of unutterable triumph.
"Mother!" cried the professor, rushing toward her in horror.
"Well, my son?" asked she, in return, with a lofty, repellent air. Her whole figure expanded; she stood there as though panoplied in brass. "You evidently mean to reproach me with having cut you and Nathanael off from share in this precious inheritance," continued she, with indescribable scorn. "Console yourself, I have long since determined to indemnify you for the loss of those few dollars out of my own treasury. You have the advantage of me there, at all events."
"Those few dollars?" repeated the lawyer—and he trembled with wrath and indignation. "Mrs. Hellwig, you will have the satisfaction of paying over to your son five thousand dollars cash."
"Five thousand dollars!" laughed Mrs. Hellwig in derision. "That is amusing! Those miserable, smutty papers! Do not make yourself ridiculous, dear Francke!"
"Those miserable, smutty papers will cost you dear, I repeat!" asseverated the young man, at the same time that he sought to retain his composure,    "tomorrow I shall lay before you a notification, in the handwriting of the deceased, which sets down the value of the collection at full five thousand dollars—the Bach MSS. not included; understand me rightly, Mrs. Hellwig.    Into what a predicament you have brought yourself, by the destruction of what was indeed priceless to the Hirschsprung heirs, remains to be seen yet!"  In the excess of his indignation, he tapped with his hand against his forehead.     "Incredible!" cried he. "John, at this minute I am reminded of an argument that I had with you a few weeks ago—you could not have had more convincing proof of the correctness of my views as then stated."
The professor made no reply. He had withdrawn to a window and turned his face toward the garden. How far he admitted the aptness of the proof cited by his highly excited friend, was left to conjecture.
For a moment it seemed as though it dawned upon Mrs. Hellwig's comprehension that she had wantonly brought upon herself an inevitable series of petty disasters; her air suddenly lost its proud consciousness of perfect rectitude and infallibility, while the derisive smile that she sought to preserve was only a distortion of the lips. But how could this self-righteous woman have ever been reduced to repenting of a step taken by herself? She always acted in the name of the Lord—so with her no error or mistake was possible. She soon recovered herself.
"Let me remind you of an expression of your own just now, Mr. Francke," said she coldly and formally, "They justly accuse the deceased of aberration of mind—it would not be hard for me to bring satisfactory proof of this. Who will persuade me, then, that that absurd valuation was no written down in a fit of madness?"
"I!" cried Felicia quickly and decidedly, although she trembled from the conflict of her feelings. "I shall try to defend the dead from such attacks as long as I can, Mrs. Hellwig! Never had any one a sounder, clearer head than she possessed—my saying so will, indeed, go for naught but if you succeed in overthrowing every other evidence of the dear lady's saneness, then there are still the portfolio here, in which the collection was preserved—I saved them. Each of these contains on the inner side a complete list of its contents; to each individual autograph was added, with extreme exactness, when, where, from whom, and at what price the same had been purchased."
"Hey, behold what a viper I have nursed, to turn against me!" burst forth from Mrs. Hellwig. "But now I shall call you to account! So you dared have the front to carry on a system of deceit for years, under my very eyes? You eat my bread, while you mocked me behind my back. If it had not been for me, you would have had beg from door to door! Begone from my sight, base deceiver!" Felicia stirred not from the door-way. It seem as though her slender form dilated underneath the reproaches hurled at her; her face grew deadly pale; but never before had the fearless, unbending spirit of the girl appeared more decidedly than at this moment.
"I deserve the reproach of having deceived you," said she, with admirable composure. "I was willfully silent and would rather have died from ill-treatment than let a hint of my secret cross my lips. This much is true. Nevertheless, this resolution stood upon a weak foundation. A good, friendly word from your lips, even a kind look would have overthrown it, for nothing is more repugnant to me than a shy concealment of my actions. A sinful deception it was not. Who would call the first Christians deceivers, because they met in secret when under prohibition? I, too, must save my soul!" She drew a deep breath, and her brown eyes were fixed with an energetic expression upon the proud woman’s face. "I should have been sunk in the darkness of night, if I had not found that asylum and protection in the attic. In that wrathful, revengeful divinity to whom you pray, Mrs. Hellwig, who preempts his children to do evil that he may then punish hem—in such a God I could not believe. The deceased guided me to the only true God, who is all love, pity, wisdom and power, and who alone reigns in heaven and earth. The impulse to learn, the love of knowledge, yas not to be eradicated from my childish soul. You had better have left me hungry, Mrs. Hellwig; it would not have been so cruel as your unwearied efforts to cramp my soul—yes, to kill it systematically. I did not mock you behind your hack, for never once did your name pass my lips up there— but I have frustrated your designs. I am he disciple of the Old Ma'm'selle!"
"Begone!" cried Mrs. Hellwig, no longer having any control of herself, and pointing her to the door.
"Not yet, auntie," pleaded the young widow urgently, holding back the stout woman's outstretched arms. "You will not let such a precious moment pass unimproved. Mr. Francke, you have just discharged your duty admirably as a devoted friend of music; I now beg of you to inquire with lie same zeal into the whereabouts of the missing plate and jewelry. If any one has a finger in this pie it is yon girl."
The lawyer approached the young girl who had convulsively caught with her left hand at the curtain before the door, and with a respectful bow offered her his arm, saying in the kindest manner: "Will you allow me to conduct you to my mother's house?"
"Here is your place!" sounded suddenly aloud and peremptorily from the lips of the hitherto speechless professor.
He stood at Felicia's side drawn up to his full height, and held her right hand fast within his own.
Young Francke involuntarily drew back, the two men measured each other for a moment in silence; the strange look that they interchanged had nothing in it now of the feeling of tranquil friendship,
"Ah, bravo! two knights upon the field, forsooth; a most interesting spectacle!" cried the young widow, laughing, while a china cup fell with a crash to the ground. At any other moment Mrs. Hellwig would have been quick to chide this " heedlessness'' on the part of her young relative, but from anger and surprise she now spoke not a word.
"It seems as though I had often occasion today to appeal to the past," interposed the lawyer, greatly provoked, after a momentary pause.    "Allow me to remind you, John, that you delegated your authority entirely to me, and empowered me to take the step that I did just now." 
"I deny not an iota of it," answered the professor, coldly. "Should you desire a valid explanation of this my inconsistency I am at your service any time—only not here." He led Felicia away from the threshold of the door, and drew her into the garden.
"Go back to town now, Felicia," said he, and his steel-gray eyes, once so icy cold, rested with indescribable fervor upon the young girl's face. "This shall have been your last battle, little Fay! Only one single night more shall you pass under my mother's roof! From tomorrow begins a new life for you!" He drew the hand which he held involuntarily closer to him, then let it drop, and returned into the house.
CHAPTER XXIII.
FELICIA left the garden with winged steps. The professor was mistaken if he expected to find her within the walls of his mother's house that evening, to say nothing of the night. Now, the moment had come when she might penetrate into Aunt Cordelia's chamber. In the avenue she was met by the old cook, who was carrying supper out into the garden; no one was at home then save Henry. What a howling and whistling among the gnarled old linden-trees! The wind drove the young girl irresistibly forward, but she was still upon firm and level ground, under the shade of strong trees; how would it be when her dizzy pathway led over steeply shelving roofs, with nothing to shield her against the assaults of the raging elements?
Henry opened the house door for her. Felicia glided breathlessly past him, stepped into the servants' room, and took the trash-room key from the wall.
''Well, what is to pay now, little Fay?" asked the old man in. astonishment.
"I would restore you your honor, and freedom to myself! Meanwhile keep good guard, Henry!" she called back, as she bounded up the steps.
"You will not do anything silly, will you? Halloo, Fay, do not run into any danger?" he called after her; but she did not hear. He had to stick to his post, and in great excitement paced up and down the front entry.
As Felicia passed along the corridor under the roof she could hear the wind overhead, sometimes sighing, sometimes breathing forth in long-drawn, whistling tones. The very rafters creaked, and through the openings of the sun-dried gutter-tiles, the sultry, heated breath of the storm-wind blew terrifically by fits and starts. At this instant a gray and motley hail-cloud hovered over the quadrangle of roofs, a pale, yellow light quivered athwart the flower-covered terrace, deceptiously glaring in at the glass doors of the front room, over which branches of ivy and the monk's creeper, loosened from their supports, were dangling helplessly, and vividly illuminated the agitated foliage of the wild grape-vine.
When the young girl put her head out of the dormer-window a violent gust of wind confronted her; it took away her breath and forced her instantly to retreat. She let her fierce enemy thus vent his spleen, but then swung herself out. Whoever had been privileged to see this lovely pale face emerge from that dark window on the roof, with its firmly compressed lips and gloomily determined brow, would have had to admit that this girl went to meet death in full consciousness of her peril, so intent was she upon her mission! What a strange compound was the soul of this young creature! so clear and cool a head, to preside over a warm heart that could hate so glowingly!
With fleet foot she ran over the grating tiles, and not for a moment were those clear eyes dazed; but her raging foe did not allow her much time in which to recover breath—a sharp whistle, and it returned to the onset again with crushing weight. The front door flew open with a clatter, flower-pots fell with a crash on the gallery floor, and the old rafters groaned and trembled under Felicia's footsteps. She stood as yet upon the roof next it, but her hands clasped the gallery balustrade, which she had just this minute reached. The storm tore loose her hair, and switched its long streamers about till it seemed as though they would be scattered to the four winds of heaven, and yet she herself stood firm. After a moment of patient waiting she swung herself over the balusters, and immediately afterward entered the front room. Behind her the tempest continued to roar and rave—she heard it no more, nor thought either of the way back, offering only a hair-breadth chance of escape from death as it did— her folded hands hung helplessly now, for she stood within the ivy-draped chamber, and was looking upon, it for the last time. Those still, snow-white faces on the walls looked down upon her, how familiarly, and yet so strangely altered—once they had lent animation to the scene, for their living thoughts, constantly recalled, used to hover about their cold brows; but now they were only an ornament, a decoration for the walls, they gazed with as much indifference upon the youthfully radiant face of the coquettish young widow as upon the pale maiden that now lifted up to them her tear-streaming countenance.
As for the rest, the room looked as comfortable and cozy as it had done in Aunt Cordelia's life-time. Not a particle of dust lay upon the mirror-like mahogany top of the piano; as a sign that things went well with it, the ivy had sent forth bright green young shoots from its dark background of leaves, and in the recess of one window stood, carefully attended to, the magnificent India rubber and palm-tree, two of the Old Ma'm'selle's favorites. But the arrangements about the other window were altered—the pretty little work-table no longer stood there, for the professor had erected this niche into a study for himself.
A burning glow suffused Felicia's face. So she stood like a thief in his room! Who knows what letters and papers lay there, not meant for an intruder's eye! He had carelessly left them lying open, for he carried the room door-key in his pocket.    The young girl flew, like a thing haunted, to the glass press.
On the side of that old piece of furniture, in the middle of an arabesque, carved with singular convolutions, was al delicate, for an uninitiated eye, almost imperceptible metal spring.    Felicia touched it with a firm pressure, and th<a door to the secret compartment flew open.    There stoocH and lay the missing valuables in the well-known orderly array'    The portly silver coffee-pot and milk-pitcher, tliel packages of heavy silver spoons, tied up with silk ribbons,! the old-fashioned caskets, containing her set of diamonds—1 all these things were precisely in the same spot which they! had occupied for many years, in the deep obscurity of concealment.    And there, in the corner, stood the case con- j taining that bracelet, but at its side the little gray box was ' tilted up, just as the Old Ma'm'selle had left it a few weeks ago, when she had thrust it in with such precipitation.    She had evidently not touched it again.
Felicia took it out with trembling hands—it was not light—must its contents die, but how? How was this to be managed?
She cautiously lifted the cover—there lay inside it a thick volume, clumsily bound in leather, the stiff leaves gaped open, and through lapse of time the back had warped. A shy glance told the young girl that the coarse paper inside was not printed, but written full and closely.
Aunt Cordelia! two eyes are now resting upon your secret—two eyes in which you have, innumerable times, read true devotion and child-like love, and a young heart that never doubted you, is throbbing violently at the bare thought of being able to solve the problem of your life! She is as perfectly convinced of your innocence as of the presence of the shining sun, but she craves to know for what you suffered; she would like to measure the greatness of your life-long self-sacrifice in all its comprehensiveness. Your secret must die; these leaves be consumed to ashes, and the mouth that has learned from childhood how to be silent will keep it as close as did your own!
The girl's trembling fingers undid the clasps. "Joseph von Hirschsprung. Studiosus philosophica," stood in strongly marked characters upon the first page. It was the diary of that student, the noble shoe-maker's son, for whose sake Aunt Cordelia was reported to have literally vexed her father to death. The writer had habitually written only on the first half of a sheet, and invariably left the other half free, undoubtedly for comments. But these vacancies had been filled by writing, in lines closely crowded together, in the fine pretty chirography of the Old Ma'm'selle herself.
Felicia read the commencement. Deep, original thoughts, expressed with a rare force and conciseness immediately enchained the roving eye and forced attention. What a wonderful man he must have been, this young shoe-maker, with an imagination full of grand images, with his penetrating judgment, and passionate heart full of ardent love! And therefore did Cordelia, daughter of the princely merchant, love him even unto death. She wrote:
"You closed your eyes forever, Joseph, and did not see how I knelt at your bedside, wrestling in prayer with God that he would spare you to me. You called upon my name incessantly, in the fever of delirium, using the sweet accents of endearment, but also the wrathful tones of a deeply wounded heart, and even the fierce outcry of a wild revenge; and when I spoke to you you stared at me as if I were a stranger, and thrust back my hand.
"You went hence, under the impression that I had broken my vow—and when all was over, and they had removed you from your couch of suffering, then I found this book under your pillow. It tells me how I have been beloved; but alas! you doubted me, too, Joseph! In deadly anguish I waited for only one single rational look, it could not have helped convincing you that I was guiltless, and my wretched lot would have been bereft of its sharpest sting—but all in vain! An eternal separation, without reconciliation between the souls sundered—there is no keener torture to which the soul can be subjected. And though I had committed the worst crimes I could not have been more cruelly punished than by this heart, which day and night utters shrieks and restlessly pursues me like the curse of Cain!
"Your great mind is now coursing its flight through illimitable space, but I am yet a wanderer on this poor little earth, and know not whether a retrospect glance is possible for you. I can speak with no one concerning my inward conflicts, and I would not either: for where should I find the person who could comprehend my loss? No one knew you but myself!    But I must, once more, tell how it all came about. In this book you have expressed your thoughts, but however bold and strong they are there runs along parallel a sweet refreshing breath of deep, imperishable love for me, Joseph.    All this speaks to me, as with living breath, and in your sympathetic voice.  I shall answer you here on the same pages where your hand has rested, and shall think that you are standing by my side with your deep eyes following the pen, as it draws stroke after stroke, until the riddle lies solved before you.    Do you remember how little Cordelia Hellwig came hunting her pet hen in the loft, when it had been scared away by the pointer?   It was dark up there, but through a slit in the boards came in a streak of golden sunshine, and millions of tiny molecules played about in the column of light.    The little girl peeped through the crevice.    Neighbor Hirschsprung had just garnered up there the fruit of his solitary field, and. high on one of the golden sheaves sat wild, dark-haired Joseph, looking through the hole in the roof.
"'You cannot find me!' called out the child through the aperture. The boy jumped down and looked around defiantly. 'You cannot find me!' was heard again. Then came a crash, and then one of the boards behind which little Cordelia was hiding fell noisily in upon our good neighbor's garret floor. Yes, that was you, Joseph, and I know that later you would have willingly crushed improper barriers thrown up to hinder the progress of mankind, and torn down many a false system, just as you did that board from behind which you were teased.
"I wept bitterly from fright, and then you suddenly became quite gentle and exceedingly kind, and led me down into the close, smoky shoe-maker's room. The board was readjusted, but from that time I daily crossed the street and paid you a visit. Ah! how delightful were those winter afternoons! Outside the weather was fearfully tempestuous; the rosemary-bush on the window-sill trembled at every gust of wind that rattled past the round, lead-encased panes of glass, and the usually hardy goldfinch clambered up on the inner wall of his cage. On the huge earthen oven bubbled the coffee-pot; your father sat bravely hammering on his bench to earn daily bread for his family, and your excellent mother sat at the buzzing spinning-wheel and spun hemp.
 "I can still see your father's noble, melancholy countenance before me, as he told of by-gone times.    Then, the Hirschsprungs had been a famous and a mighty race, a race of giant size and proportionate strength!    What an incalculable series of heroic deeds had their strong arms performed!   But, I hated to think of the streams of noble human blood that they had shed.    I much preferred to hear the story of the knight who had loved his young wife so truly and faithfully.    He caused two bracelets to be made, and had engraved on each the half of a love-verse; he wore one bracelet and his beloved wife the other.    And when he fell mortally wounded in battle there came a base robber and tried  to wrest from him  this precious love token; but the dying man pressed his left hand convulsively upon his treasure, allowing his hand to be hacked and hewn, until his squire hurried up and slew the robber. The bracelets were preserved as relics in the family until— until the Swedes came.    How you used to hate those Swedes, Joseph, in those days!    They had been to blame for the downfall of the Von Hirschsprungs.    That was a very mournful story, and therefore I did not like it at all; when, every time your father would wind up by saying: 'You see, Joseph, if that misfortune had not happened you might have studied and been a great man, but now you have nothing before you but a shoe-maker's bench.'
"Ah! that story had quite a different effect from what your good father suspected.
"The Hirschsprungs had remained good Papists even when the whole country around fell off from the church, and were converted to the new Lutheran doctrines. From that time on they lived in strict retirement, on account of their faith, but this did not satisfy old Adrian von Hirschsprung, for he was a wild fanatic, who preferred deserting his old homestead and dear old Thuringia, to living among heretics. He had sold all his possessions, save the house on Market Square, for sixty thousand dollars in gold, and one day his two sons rode away, in order to find a new home some Catholic country. It happened that Gustavus Adolphus, the Swedish king, marched through Thuringia. He rested one day in the little town of X------ (it was on October 22d, 1632), and his men occupied the houses. The house of the knights on Market Square was filled up with Swedish cavalrymen, and this must have excited the utmost ire of old Adrian. It came to a violent dispute between him and the soldiers, who were carousing, half-drunk, in the court-yard, and then happened a dreadful thing—a soldier thrust the old zealot through the body with his sword; he fell back upon the flag-stones, with outstretched arms, and expired upon the spot. But the infuriated Swedes slashed around and destroyed everything in the house that was movable, so that when the sons of the family returned, old Adrian had long lain in the vault of our Lady's church, and they sought for their property in vain. The Swedes had made way with all their sixty thousand dollars in money, store-rooms and chests were empty, their contents lying on the floor trodden under-foot and torn to tatters, and the family papers were scattered to the four winds of heaven, not a vestige of them being left behind. Such was your father's account of the matter, Joseph! Then for a pitiful sum, the house fell into the hands of Citizen Hellwig. The two sons of Adrian shared the proceeds; Lutz, the elder, moved off and nothing more was ever heard of him, but the other branch of the family hung their knightly swords upon the wall, and their descendants, who had once fought with the Saracens, and made a fine appearance at the Imperial Court, on account of their valor and courtly manners, now took up awl and plane.
"But not you, Joseph! As the glorious curls upon your forehead would have their own sweet way, so your spirit soared far above the contracted sphere of life in which your latest progenitors had moved. You went your own way, although you knew that it was a hard and thorny one; that want and privation must be your companions; you only saw the goal, the high and glittering goal, and so much heroism ended shamefully in a garret! The spirit winged its flight, because the body was an hungered! Oh, Most High, one of the most glorious of Thy creations perished for the lack of bread! Who could have supposed this utter extinction of you being possible, when listening to the development of your new, bold, and original ideas? Or beholding you as you sat at the piano bringing forth such wondrous strains of music? It was a poor little spinet, that stood in a dark corner of your father's room; its tones sounded weak and wiry, but your genius could put life into it, and at your command storm and tempest could be evoked, and when they died away a laughing sky was made to appear, spanning a blissful world. Do you remember your good father's way of rewarding you, when he was pleased with you? Then, with solemn gesture, he would unlock a little old-fashioned cupboard, and lay a note-book on the table. It was the operetta of John Sebastian Bach; his grandfather had received it, as a present, from the great composer himself, and it was preserved in the family as an heirloom. When you departed this life, not one cent of money, or scrap of bread, was to be found in your abode, but the manuscript of Bach's operetta lay untouched on the table, sealed and directed to me, although you well knew its material value.
"On the opposite side of the page, exactly on the spot where I am writing now, there stands: 'My sweet, golden-haired Cordelia came over in her white dress.' (It was my confirmation-day, Joseph!) My stern mother had told me that it was to be for the last time, inasmuch as I was now a wealthy merchant's grown-up daughter, and it was no longer seemly that I should keep company with a shoemaker's family. Your parents were not in the room, and I acquainted you with the prohibition. How pale your face looked in contrast with your coal-black curls! 'Well, go, then,' you said proudly, stamping with your foot, but your voice broke down, and tears sparkled in your angry eyes. I did not go, though, for suddenly our hands were interlocked, as if unconsciously and indissolubly; this was the beginning of our sacred love!
"Could I ever have possibly forgotten this, and after resisting my angry and imploring parents for years, suddenly broken my vows of my own accord? They called you a starveling, a wretched shoe-maker's son, pursuing a beggarly art; they threatened me with their curse and disinheritance. I remained steadfast; how easy it was then, when you were near me! But when your parents died, and you went off to Leipsic, ah! then came a horrible time! There appeared one day, in my father's house, a man of tall, slender figure, and upon this figure rested a head with thin, sleek, dark hair hung down on either side, and the lines about his mouth were drawn up and puckered. There is such a thing as prophetic vision, Joseph, and it takes the form of instinct in a pure-minded person's breast. I knew immediately that evil had come to our house, in the shape of that man. My father had an entirely different opinion of this Paul Hellwig. He was, to be sure, a near relative—the son of a man who had made a large fortune out in the world, and occupied a respectable position. The visit of this young cousin, therefore, was regarded quite in the light of an honor. And how low that tall form could stoop, and how sweet and unctuous could be his language!
"You know that the wretch dared to make love to me; you know, too, that I peremptorily rejected his suit; ho was mean and pusillanimous enough to appeal from me to my father, who conceived an ardent desire for this union; and now horrible days began for me!
"Your letters never reached me, being intercepted by my father, and found, after his death, lying alongside mine to you. I was treated like a prisoner; but still nobody could force me to stay in the room whenever the object of my abhorrence appeared. So soon as I caught sight of him, I would flee, like some hunted animal, to the remotest corners of the house, and the spirits of your ancestors protected me, Joseph! I found hiding-places enough, where I was secure against my pursuer.
"Could it have been the mysterious finger of some invisible ancestress, that one day directed my eyes to the gold piece lying at my feet?
"A wall in the poultry-yard had fallen in and workmen had been there that afternoon, and torn down the rotten part. I sat still on the ruins and thought of the time when these stones had been laid one upon the other, and all of a sudden, there lay a gold piece on the grass before me; it was not the only one; others glittered through the chinks of the mortar. Undoubtedly a considerable piece of the wall had caved in after the workmen left, for a quantity of rubbish lay confusedly around, and from the midst of the broken pieces peeped forth the sharp edges of a wooden trunk. It had burst open on one side, and through the hole, it was seen to be packed full of gold coins.
"Joseph, I had not rightly understood the hint given me by your ancestress. I ran for my father, and he brought with him that hateful man. With unwearied efforts they lifted the trunk out of its hiding-place, and unlocked it with the great key that was still hid in the castle. So it had not been the Swedes, Joseph! There lay the two bracelets in good preservation, the sixty thousand dollars in gold, and the old yellow parchments and papers belonging to the Hirschsprungs! Old Adrian had secreted all these things here to save them from the Swedes! I was wild with joy. 'Father,’ I exclaimed, exultantly, 'Joseph is no longer a starveling now, is he?’
"I can see him still, as he stood there! You know he had a grave, stern face, and a merry word would, die away upon his lips, if you only caught a glimpse of that forbidding frown of his and his rigid features; but his whole appearance bore the impress of incorruptible integrity—he was the most respected man in town. Now he stood leaning forward, and his hands burrowed in the gold. What a peculiar glance was that which now fell upon me out of his keen, cold eyes!
"'The shoe-maker's 'prentice!' repeated he; ' what has he to do with it?'
"'Why, that is his inheritance, father!' I had old Adrian's will in my hand, and pointed to the name, Hirschsprung.
"Oh, how abominably altered suddenly became that immovable countenance!
"'Are you mad?' shrieked he, shaking me by the arm.  ‘This house belongs to me, with all that it contains, and I want to see him who shall fetch away one pennyworth of what is found on my estate!'
"'You are perfectly just in your claim, dear cousin,' assented Paul Hellwig, in his softest voice. 'But before you, the house, with all it contained, belonged to my grandfather.'
"'All right, Paul. I do not deny your claim!' said my father.
"They bore the trunk between them into the house. Nobody knew of the robbery but I and the last ray of the evening sun that cast a curious look at the sparkling gold. It died away, to wake up new on the other side, and, may be, greet a blissful human countenance; but I wandered around, seeing night, curses, and crime, in whatever direction I looked!
"And yet, on the same evening, I heard how Paul Hellwig had claimed and obtained thirty thousand dollars and one of the bracelets.
"'Know you now what I suffered while you deemed me faithless, false, and fickle? I had alone to confront my tormentors—my strict but upright mother was dead, and my only brother away in foreign lands. The question was no longer a simple one as regarded my love to you—I was to keep this secret inviolate from you and the world, and to this I never would give my consent! Did your heart never beat quickly and apprehensively at those wretched moments, when I resolutely held my ground before my infuriated father, and he would lift his hand to fell to the earth his 'obstinate, degenerate daughter'?
"I had retained old Adrian's will, they did not know it, arid one evening when Paul Hellwig mockingly asked what proof I could give of the existence of the treasure found, I referred to this paper, and then came the fearful end! That afternoon my father had attended a grand entertainment, and returned with his face much flushed, as if he had been drinking. On hearing my declaration he rushed up to me, shook me with his strong hands until 1 had to cry out for pain, and gnashing his teeth, asked me if I cared not a rush for his honor and reputation. He had hardly uttered the last words before he hurled me back, his face turned purple, he clutched his neck with both hands and suddenly fell down, as though crushed, before me—he, the tall, stately man!
"He breathed still when we got him lifted up; yes, he must even have been conscious, for his glance rested fixedly upon my face, with a horrible expression, and then my opposition gave way, Joseph! When the doctor had left the room for a moment, I drew the paper out and held it to the flame of the candle. I could not look at my father, but I swore to him with averted face that I would keep my peace forever, that, with my consent, no stain should be put upon his honor. With what a demoniacal smile Paul Hellwig listened to this oath! Oh, Joseph, this is what I did! I secured to my family that stolen inheritance, at the very moment when want had thrown you upon a bed of death."
CHAPTER XXIV.
FELICIA shut up the book, utterly exhausted, she could not read any further. The wind whistled and beat against the windows until they rattled and shook—what was this blustering of the storm in comparison with that warring of human passion of which this book told?
Aunt Cordelia, you have been tortured and crucified! Those who have reveled in that stolen wealth placed themselves on the lofty plane of inherited family virtue and rectitude; they thrust you forth as one degenerate, and the blind world confirmed this sentence of condemnation. High up in the air you stayed, outlawed and calumniated, while behind those firmly closed lips rested your secret! You did not call down woes upon the blind ones down below—they often eat of your bread, and unwillingly took hold of your helping hand in times of misery and distress. Your strong mind created a world of its own, and that sweet, placid smile, that glorified your features in old age, was the victory of an exalted soul!
What a chimera is public opinion! The world has nothing more hollow, and yet it has power to take fast and decided hold upon the fate of individuals! Do not families suffer, after the lapse of years, for a single member whom public opinion has denounced and put under its ban, and are there not races who forever bear about with them the halo of inherited virtue and respectability, merely because their name runs glibly off the mouth of the people? How much unpunished rascality has public opinion upon its conscience, and how often modest merit weeps under its blind kicks.
The family of Hellwig belonged to the class of the immaculates. If any one had dared to point his finger at the stateliest and proudest of those portraits in the balcony-room and say, "That is a thief!" he would have been stoned from that great heap. And yet he had cheated the poor shoe-maker's son out of his inheritance; he had died, honorable man as he was called, with that theft upon his conscience, and his descendants were proud of the hardly and honestly earned wealth of the old mercantile house. If he knew that, if he could cast a glance into this book, he, who had brought into subjection his own desire, out of regard to sacred traditions of that sort, who had so long maintained the opinion that virtue and vice, high mind and vulgarity, were linked to family and station in life, but not to single individuals!
As though involuntarily Felicia extended her right hand, containing the book, and waved it above her head triumphantly with sparkling eyes. What hindered her from letting this little gray box, with its frightful contents, lie there on his desk? Then he would come in and unsuspiciously seat himself in that snug, ivy-curtained niche. His weighty brain full of deep thoughts, he takes up his pen to continue work upon the manuscript lying there. Suddenly his eyes fall upon that little unfamiliar object before him; he lifts the lid, takes out the book and reads, and reads until he sinks back as pale as death, until the steel gray eyes grow dim beneath the weight of a horrible discovery. Then is his self-conceit crushed for all time to come. He bears about with him, in secret, the burden of shame. Will he enjoy the pleasantness of inherited wealth—they are stolen pleasures; he hears his name called, of whose associations he had been so proud—a hideous memory attaches to it. His spirit is inwardly broken, crashed for all time to come—the proud man!
The book and its case fall unresistingly to the floor, and burning tears gush from Felicia's eyes. No, a thousand times rather die, than do him this hurt. Was the trembling mouth that uttered these words the same which had once passionately exclaimed within these very walls: "I should not pity him if misfortune overtook him, and although I could help him to fortune I would not stir a finger to do it!"? Was this really the old, fierce hatred, that made her weep, and filled her heart with unspeakable woe, at the bare idea of his sufferings? Abhorrence was it? this sweet feeling with which she suddenly conjured up before her his powerful manly form, and had the blissful sense of satisfaction in being called upon to hold out her hand protectingly over his head, in order to guard him against an overwhelming blow; had such feelings anything in common with the hateful passion of revenge? Hatred, abhorrence, thirst for revenge—they had disappeared from her soul and left not a trace behind. Oh, no! she had lost her rudder. She fell backward and clasped her hands before her face; that mysterious controversy that had been going on within her heart was explained now, but that light came not to her with the mild radiance of some heavenly planet, revealing suddenly a lovely, smiling landscape, whose existence was undreamed of before; it was a keen flash of lightning, making visible a chasm yawning before her footsteps.
Away, away! nothing should detain her longer!   Once more wend her way across the roofs, then the last hasty step over the Hellwig threshold, and she was free, escaped never to return!
She picked up the book and thrust it into her pocket, but there she stood, with foot lifted ready for flight, and bated breath—for a moment she seemed to be turned to stone; out in the entry a door had been slammed, and now someone was coming, with quick step, toward the sitting-room. She flew into the front apartment, and tore open the glass door; the storm burst in, and dashed a few great rain drops in her face. Her eyes strayed over the square of house tops. She could not get across in that way now, she would inevitably be seen; her only chance for safety was in temporary concealment.
Between the wall of the balcony and the flower-pots ran a narrow, unoccupied space. Felicia took refuge upon this, and having climbed up, reeling and with failing eyes, she seized hold of the iron stem of the lightning-rod that ran along the ridge of the roof. She stood aloft on top of the balcony. Whew! how the storm seized and shook her ; delicate form, as it sought, in renewed fury, to hurl her down into the street, that yawned like a deep gulf on the other side. Black storm-clouds were brewing over the whole face of the heavens—was there no angel up there, above that seething, fomenting mass, who could stretch down protecting hands to that mortal wrestling with the most awful danger?
Whoever should step out on the gallery at this moment, in his eyes the girl up there would stand branded as a thief. She had penetrated into locked places—the whole world called that burglary.    They had already hurled at her head the accusation of having cognizance of the missing silver— now, her guilt would be self-evident.    No longer should she be permitted voluntarily to depart from the old merchant-house—she would be driven hence in disgrace, and like Aunt Cordelia, henceforth must, with closed lips, bear through life a load of undeserved ignominy and reproach. Would it be so very shocking after all, if she should voluntarily resign herself into the arms of the tempest, and after a few moments of agony, breathe her young life out upon the pavement stones below?   With dazed looks she stared down upon the jutting roof of the balcony; the person below did not remain standing before the glass door—Felicia's last desperate hope—but in spite of the raging storm, walked further and further out upon the gallery, and now the form became visible—it was the professor. Had he heard the maiden's fugitive steps?
His back was still turned to her, it was just possible that he might retrace his steps without having seen her; but now came the storm, that traitor: the professor was forced to turn around, and at the same instant the hair and garments of the fugitive fluttered wildly; and he caught sight of that figure whose arms convulsively embraced the iron rod, and that ghastly face that looked down upon him from out that waving mass of hair, with eyes that spoke nothing but despair.
For one instant it seemed as though the blood in her veins froze beneath the horrified gaze that met his own; but then, boiling, it darted to her head and deprived her of the last remains of self-possession.
"Yes, here stands the thief! Fetch the constable; call Mrs. Hellwig! I am convicted!" she called down amidst bitter laughter. With her left hand, she let go the iron rod, and threw back the hair that the wind had lashed over her face.
"For God's sake!" shrieked the professor, "hold by the rod—else you are lost!"
"Well for me if it were all over," sounded cuttingly upon the blast that came whistling by.
He saw not the narrow ledge, by means of which Felicia had climbed up. In a few minutes he had dashed over some flower-pots, and cleared a way for himself, and now he suddenly stood beside her. With irresistible power he embraced the resisting form, and drew it down into the balcony—with a crash the door fell to behind them.
The girl's strong, courageous spirit was broken—perfectly stunned, she knew not that her supposed adversary was still supporting her; her eyes were closed, and saw not the intense fervor of the glance that now rested upon her pallid features. "Felicia," he whispered with deep, pleading voice.
She started up, and immediately comprehended her situation. All the resentment and bitterness which her soul had been cherishing for so many years once more came over her in a full tide; she burst away from him with vehemence, and now again appeared that demoniacal expression, that dug a deep furrow between her eyebrows, and drew sharp lines about the corners of her mouth.
"How can you touch the Pariah?" she asked, mockingly. But her highly erect form drooped again directly; she buried her face in her hands and murmured resentfully: "Well, then, hear me — you will be content with my deposition!"
He took her hands gently between his own:
"First of all, you must compose yourself, Felicia!" said he, in those soft, soothing accents that had already moved her, in spite of herself, as heard addressed to a suffering child. ''I would not heed that wild spirit of defiance, which leads you willfully to hurt my feelings! Look around and remember where we are! Here you used to play as a child, did you not? Here the lonely old lady, whom you defended so bravely today, gave you protection, instruction, and love, did she not? Whatever you have been doing or seeking here, it was nothing wrong. I know that, Felicia. You are defiant, imbittered, and beyond measure proud, and these qualities often mislead you into harshness and injustice—but you are incapable of a mean action. I do not know how it was, but I felt as if I must find you up here. Henry's scared, embarrassed face, his involuntary glance toward the staircase, when I asked for you, strengthened me in my impression. Say now a word!" he continued, with elevated voice, as she lifted upon him her burning eyes and opened her lips. "I will listen to you, indeed, but in a sense wholly different from what you imagine—and I believe that I have a right to, after braving storm and tempest in order to fetch down my fir-tree."
He drew her further into the room—it seemed as though it were too light for him in the front chamber, as though he needed the half twilight of the drawing-room, in order to be able to go on with what he wanted to say. Felicia could feel that his hand trembled slightly. She stood on precisely the same spot where she hacl lately fought that fierce battle with self, where she had been tempted to thrust a dagger into his very heart, to maim him morally for life. Her head sunk low upon her breast, and she felt like a culprit, beneath the gaze of eyes, usually so very grave, but now lit up with a wondrous glow.
"Oh, Felicia! what if you had fallen!" again he began, and it seemed as if a shudder passed over his strong frame, at the bare imagination of such a possibility. "Must I tell you what you would have inflicted upon me, through that desperate pride, which would rather perish than appeal to the rational judgment of another? And think you not that a moment of deadly anguish and untold suffering may atone for years of injustice?"
He paused, full of expectation, but the young girl's blanched lips remained fast closed, and her dark eyelashes still swept her cheeks.
"You have fairly run away with yourself through your bitter way of looking at things," said he, after waiting vainly for a few minutes, in a sad and sinking voice that betokened discouragement; it is simply impossible for you to apprehend a change of things." He had let her hands drop, but now once more grasped her right hand and pressed it impulsively to his breast. "Felicia, you told me not long ago that you idolized your mother—that mother used to call you Fay; I know that all who love you give you that name, and so I, too, will say: 'Fay, I seek a reconciliation!''
"I have no longer any ill-will toward you!" she murmured with stifled voice.
"That assurance says much, coming from your lips; it exceeds my expectations, and yet it is far from being satisfactory. What would it avail, if we two were reconciled, and then had to part never to meet again? How would it help me to know that you no longer disliked me, if I could not have hourly proof of it? If two are reconciled, who were divided as we have been, then they belong together— not even one mile do I intend to part us henceforth—go with me, Fay!"
"I have an aversion to life in a boarding-school. I could not restrict myself to the bondage of its rules," answered she hurriedly and with emotion.
An approach to a smile flitted over his face.
"Ah, and I would not like it for you either! The idea of the institute was only a make-shift, Fay. That plan would have left me as badly off as ever. It might happen that I could not see you for one or even two days, and there a dozen inquisitive school-mates would be always at hand to catch up every word that dropped between us; or Mrs. von Berg, the strict principal, would sit down by our side and not even allow me to hold this little hand in mine. Now, I must have uninterrupted leave to look into this dear, defiant face. I must know that when I come home from the exercise of my calling, my Fay is looking out for me and thinking of me. I must be allowed, of a quiet evening, within the privacy of my own parlor, to ask for 'a song, Fay!' But all this can only come to pass when you are my wife!"
Felicia uttered a shriek, and tried to break away from him; but he held her fast, and drew her closer to him.
"The thought alarms you, does it, Fay?" said he, deeply agitated. "Let me hope that it is only alarm at what is unexpected, and nothing worse. I say to myself that it will probably take you a long time to come to the point for which I long. Your disposition does not accommodate itself to a change readily, especially such an one as would transform an object of peculiar aversion into one of fond affection. But I mean to woo you with all the perseverance of an imperishable love, I will wait—hard as this may be—until you say to me of your own accord: 'I will, John!' I know what miracles may be wrought in the human breast. I fled from this little town, in order to escape myself and fearful inner conflicts, and lo! the miracle was straightway performed! The most painful longing, by contrast, made these conflicts seem as nothing. I now know that-what I wanted to fathom and defiantly shake off would constitute the blessedness of my life. Fay, in the midst of trifling chit-chat and coquettish looks, a solitary maiden with energetic mien and a white forehead full of sense and thought, was with me incessantly as I wandered over hill and dell—she belonged to me, she was the other half of my life. I saw that I could not sunder myself from her without inwardly bleeding! And now, one single word of comfort, Fay!"
The young girl had gradually withdrawn her hand from his. How was it possible for the alteration that took place in her face while he spoke to escape his observation? The brows were contracted as though she were in violent physical pain; her downcast eyes were riveted on the floor, and her ice-cold fingers were convulsively intertwined.
"Would you get comfort from me?" answered she, in a faint voice. "An hour ago you said to me, 'You have gone through your last battle,’ and now, with your own hand, you invite me into the most terrible conflict through which the human soul can be called to pass! What is battling with outward foes, compared to wrestling with one's self and one's own wishes?" She threw up her clasped hands, and dashed her head back in the abandonment of despair. "I do not know what crime I have committed that God should have planted this unhappy love in my heart!"
"Fay!"
The professor extended his arms to clasp her to his breast, but she spread out her hands deprecatingly, although a faint ray of gladness illumined her features. "Yes, I do love you—that you shall know," repeated she, in tones vacillating between rapture and despair. "I wish that I could just now say: 'I will, John!' but those words will never be uttered!"
He drew back and a corpse-like pallor settled upon his face; he knew that girl, "with her energetic mien, and white brow fully of sense and thought," well enough not to know that by that sentence she was lost for him.
"You fled from X------, and why so?" asked she more firmly. She drew herself up, and one of her most penetrating looks met his eyes, whence suddenly all life had departed. "I will tell you. Your love to me was a crime against your family; you put aside all the principles in which you had been nurtured, and must, therefore, be plucked, like a- weed, from your heart. That you did not come back cured from your jaunt was no fault of yours—you succumbed before that same power which also forces me to love you against my will. Well may that have been an imbittered contest which compelled all those honored merchant-princes to make way before the despised actor's child —nothing in the world will make me believe that I can retain this place for a whole life-time! A few weeks ago you expressed to me the firm conviction that inequality of rank in marriage would inevitably revenge itself. This opinion you have held, Heaven knows, for how many years, and it cannot possibly be thoroughly eradicated in the course of six weeks. It has only been overpowered for the time being, and will surely reassert its sway. And even supposing that it had given way to another conviction, what could expunge from my soul the recollection of that remark of yours?"
She was silent for a moment from exhaustion.     The professor had pressed his right hand before his eyes, and a slight tremor was perceptible in the movement of his lips, as tie now let her hand drop, and said despondently: "The past is against me, Felicia, but you are in error, nevertheless. Alas! how shall I prove it to you?"
"Not the least thing has altered in our outward relations," continued she inexorably. " Neither has a blot appeared upon your escutcheon, nor have I, in any wise, escaped from my despicable situation. Hence, it is my individuality alone which has affected this revolution of sentiment. It were rash and unprincipled of me to profit by a moment of weakness that leads you to sacrifice principles that have grown with your growth, and have the sanction of your mature judgment, for the sake of love. I ask you, upon your conscience: Is it not true that you have a very high opinion of your family's antecedents? And have you, even for a moment, been able to persuade yourself that those ancestors of yours (having all married equals themselves) would smile approval upon such a mesalliance on the part of their descendant?"
"Felicia, you say that you love me, and are yet capable of torturing me so systematically!" cried he passionately.
Her glance, that had rested fixedly upon his face, melted now. In those proud, reproachful eyes, who would have ever looked for the expression of ineffable tenderness that animated them now? She took the professor's right hand between both of hers.
"Just now, when you pictured life at your side, I suffered more than can be imagined," said she, in deepest agitation. "Probably hundreds of others in my place would close their eyes to the future, and grasp at the happiness of the present; but constituted as I am, I cannot. What would stay as a life-time dread before me would be your repentance. At every gloomy look, at every appearance of displeasure upon your brow I would think: the moment of regret has come now; he has gone back now to his original views, he inwardly repudiates you as the source of his downfall. I should make you unhappy by these suspicions, which I could not control."
"You make a horrible retaliation!" said he bitterly in hollow tones. "For that matter I will cheerfully accept the chance of unhappiness from that quarter. I will bear your suspicion unmurmuringly, deeply wounding as it might be. Felicia, I will make so sweet a home for you that evil thoughts could not intrude themselves. It will surely happen that I shall sometimes wear an air of trouble and bring home many a dark look with me—such evidences of care are inseparable from my calling—but so soon as I catch a glimpse of my Fay, every furrow will be smoothed down, and black looks break away before the sunshine of her presence. Can you actually have the heart to turn a deaf ear to your own love, and seal the misery of a man to whom you might give earth's sweetest bliss?"
Felicia had gradually approached the door: she felt her moral force weakening before an eloquence that found too traitorous an echo within her own breast, and yet she must stand firm for his sake.
"If you could live with me in solitude and retirement, then I would willingly follow you," replied she, catching at the door-knob, as though it were her last support. "Do not believe that I dread the world and its judgments, it judges most blindly and unjustly, but in intercourse with you, the enemy that I dread is in yourself. With you a respectable origin weighs heavily in the scale, and in this the world agrees with you. You have considerable family pride,, although you allow it no voice just at present: in future intercourse with your honorable associates, earlier or later, the regretful thought must come to you, that you have sacrificed much, very much, for my sake."
"That is to say, then, that I must woo you in another manner. I must either renounce my sphere of labor and live in a wilderness, or rake up some wrong-doing or unworthy moment in my family's past traditions!" cried he, provoked and disappointed.
A sudden blush tinted the maiden's cheeks at this last remark of his. In voluntarily her hand felt among the folds of her dress for the gray box, that she might be assured of its safety.
The professor paced up and down the room in indescribable agitation.
"The defiant, unbending element in your character has already given me much to do," continued he in the same tone, as he stood still before Felicia. "It attracts and imbitters me at the same time. At this very moment, however, when you are, with cruel consistency, casting away my love, and condemning yourself to so profitless, a self sacrifice, I feel a sort of hatred, a wild fury—I could do anything—but renounce you! I see well that there is, for the present, no hope of prevailing with you—but of giving you up my soul dreams not! Your assurance that you love me, is, for me, an irrevocable oath. You will never be untrue to me, will you, Felicia?"
"No," she answered quickly; and, as it were against her will, once more the love-light gleamed in her eyes.
The professor laid his hand upon the crown of her head as though bestowing a blessing, gently lifted up her face and gazed upon it with eyes expressive of a strange commingling of grief, reproach, and a passionate admiration. He slightly shook his head as her eyelashes slowly dropped beneath that pleading gaze, while her lips remained firmly closed. A deep sigh heaved his breast.
"Well, go then!" said he sadly, and with deep emotion. "I consent to a separation for the present, but only on condition that I may often see you wherever you may be, and that we keep up a correspondence."
She inwardly reproached herself for being so unspeakably weak as to hold out her band to him in token of assent, although accept the proffered consolation she could not. He walked away quickly, and she stepped out into the front hall.
CHAPTER XXV.
WHEN outside, she involuntarily stretched out her arms toward heaven, in speechless agony. How had she suffered in those last minutes, that exceeded in bitterness and pain all that this young, sorely tried heart had ever yet been called to encounter!

As though, unconsciously, she drew forth the little box; the secret that it contained would at once tear down the barriers that interposed between herself and the man she loved, for it would weigh heavily in the scale of equality of birth; the tempter had come to her again.
No, Aunt Cordelia! your will shall be done, clearly as this book acquits you! And he? Time will cure him; the pain of renunciation sanctifies the soul, but cognizance of crime humiliates and maims it for life. Within this very hour must this noxious little book be reduced to ashes!
Felicia once more looked back toward the door, behind which she conld hear the professor restlessly pacing to and fro, then she glided down the attic steps and noiselessly opened the painted door.
The pedestrian, who, unawares, steps upon the loathsome body of a snake, and suddenly sees the monster rear his head to strike at him, could not feel a greater pang of horror than did Felicia, just as she emerged upon the corridor. Five fingers with the clamping power of a vise laid hold of her left hand, which still had the box in it, and close to her face two eyes sparkled with a greenish glare. Could those be the sweet, soft, Madonna-like eyes of the young widow?
Just at this moment that beautiful woman had entirely cast off the fascination pertaining to womanly grace and gentleness. How could those rosy fingers, wont to intwine so tenderly and graciously in the attitude of devotion, grip so fiercely and hold so tightly? What an expression of Satanic malice was in that angelic countenance, and the soft outlines of her childish features were distorted until they were hardly recognizable!
"This is charming, indeed, you pretty, proud Caroline, that I should have met you precisely at this minute, when you were about to secrete the very choicest of your stolen treasures," cried she, with mocking laughter, quickly joining the power of her other hand, too, to that of the vise-like grasp which she had already to bear upon the maiden's hand, that struggled to be free. "Be so good as to hold this, little traitor, a while longer in your hand—for it does not suit my purposes at all that you should let it drop. Patience, for a single minute more; I need a witness, in order to be able to prove in court that I caught the thief in the very act. John, John!"
With what a shrill, screeching sound, rang through the corridor that usually silvery-tongued voice, whose dulcet notes were supposed only to respond to calls of charity and Christian mildness!
"Pray, for God's sake, let me go, madame!" implored Felicia, in agonized tones, while she struggled with her.
"Not for the world! He shall see whom he placed at his side today. It was right sweet to hear him: ' Here is your place!' You believed that you had reached the goal at which you aim, you base coquette, but I am still here too!"
She repeated her cry for help—it was unnecessary; the professor had already descended the stairs, and stood in the door-way; at the same time Henry appeared at the other end of the corridor.
"Ah! so you were up there, John?" cried the young widow. "I thought you were down on the second floor. In that case, the act of this young juggler's daughter is so much the more wonderful, in that she has whisked off some of your dead aunt's property from under your very nose!" Are you out of your senses, Adele?" exclaimed he, quickly, leaving the lowest step, whence he had overlooked in astonishment the incomprehensible scene that presented itself.
"Not by any means," rang back ironically. "Do not deem me officious, dear cousin, in thus being forced to usurp the duties of sheriff. But Lawyer Francke indignantly declined to aid me in discovering who had stolen the silverware; you yourself took this piece of innocence under your wings—what then was left me but to act independently? You see these five fingers here, they encircle the box that they have purloined from up yonder—let this fact be noted, and now let us see what the magpie was bearing off to her nest."
With lightning-like speed she jerked the box out of Felicia's hand. That young girl uttered a shriek, and in perfect agony snutched after the secret of which she had been robbed; but the widow flew laughing with her prey a few steps further down that corridor, and with feverish haste lifted the lid.
"A book!" she murmured in surprise—box and lid fell to the floor. She took the volume with both hands, shook it violently hither and thither, turned it upside down, and let the leaves fall far apart—there must and should fall out bank-notes, documents, or something of value—but lo! there was nothing of the sort.
Meanwhile Felicia had recovered from her deadly fright. She followed the lady, and gravely requested to have the book back. But despite her outward calmness, inward anxiety was plainly perceptible in her voice.
"Ha! do you actually expect me to do that?" cried the young widow mockingly, turning her back upon her, while she pressed the book to her bosom. "You look much too anxious for me to resign my suspicions immediately," continued she, while she contemptuously sneered back at the girl from over her shoulder. "There must be some knavish design lurking behind all these sly doings! Just let me look into it, my little one!"
She opened the book. There were no bank-notes nor treasures of any sort lying between the leaves, that were yellow from age—only words, loving and gracefully written words. But if a dagger had suddenly sprung from this ugly little book, and pierced the young widow to the heart, she could not have been more 'frightfully agitated and disconcerted than by the .passing glance which she gave at these harmless-looking little words scattered over the open pages. The rosy face grew pale to the very lips; she instinctively drew her hand over her horror-stricken eyes, and her plump, well-developed figure looked, for a moment, as though without a support it would totter and fall.
But this young lady had all her life-time been practicing self-control in the presence of company, for the sake of wearing the mask of godliness. She had learned piously to turn up her eyes heavenward like a very madonna, although her heart was swelling with hatred and malice; she could listen with the deepest reverence to a sermon while her soul was tarrying at the toilet: she spoke, wherever she could, with the flush of indignation upon her cheek, concerning the sinful practices of the world and the shameful neglect of Bible-reading, and at the same time in secret pored over the most lascivious French novels.
This incredible pliancy and elasticity of her outer man had stood her in good stead at many a critical moment, and now too, only a few seconds were needed for restoring her to her most perfect self-possession. She clapped the book to, and an excellently acted expression of disappointment played around her pale lips.
"Why really, after all, it is nothing but the merest old trash!" called she across to the professor; while, as though half in abstraction, she thrust the book into her pocket. "I find it very silly of you, Caroline, to give rise to such an excitement just for the sake of frippery like that!"
"She caused the excitement, did she?" asked the professor, coming quickly forward. "I thought it was you who called aloud for help in order to convict this young girl of stealing silver, in the presence of witnesses! Will you be so good as to give the grounds for your unworthy accusation upon the spot?"
"You see that just at this minute I am not in a position to—"
"Just at this minute!" interrupted he, passionately, "you are to retract that insult, and give full satisfaction to the person whom you have tried to injure without delay, here, in presence of Henry and me!"
"With the greatest pleasure possible, dear John. Certainly, it is a Christian duty to confess an error and make up for it. My good Caroline, pardon me for having done you an injustice."
"And now give back the book!" was the professor's further order, given briefly and inexorably.
"The book?" she asked, having perfectly recovered her playfully childish manner.    ''Why, John, dearest, it does not belong to Caroline." "Who told you that?"
"Why, in the hasty glance I took at it, I read the name of old Aunt Cordelia. If anybody has a claim to it, it is you, as heir to her furniture and books. It has not the slightest material value in itself—it appears to be a copy of old poems. What would you do with such sentimental stuff? But I have a fancy for such curious old books—in spite of its coarseness and vulgarity it would be an addition to my cabinet of rarities. Please give it to me."
"Perhaps so, after I have seen it myself," answered he, coldly, shrugging his shoulders and holding out his hand for the book.
"But it would have enhanced value in my eyes if you would pass it over to me without looking at it," she begged, in the sweetest, most coaxing manner. "Must I not think that you objected, from mercenary motives, to giving me the first and only present for which I ever asked you?"
A great vein on the professor's forehead was seen to swell with anger.
"I declare to you that it is a matter of perfect indifference to me what you think of my retaining it," said he, cuttingly. "I want the book back whether or no. I think that you are acting very suspiciously. The manuscript copy of some old, sentimental poetry cannot possibly have caused so perfect a woman of the world as yourself to turn so deadly pale as you did just now."
As he thus spoke he blocked up the lady's way; her unconscious glance down the corridor, and a swift movement, betrayed incontestably her design of betaking herself to flight. The professor grasped her hand, and held it firmly. Felicia was beside herself at the thought of his carrying his point. It was dreadful for her, it is true, to know that the book was in the possession of that wretched hypocrite; but she was obliged to admit to herself that it was as safe there as with her, and that, in any case, its immediate destruction was insured. She therefore ranged herself on the lady's side, and endeavored to expedite her flight.
"Please, professor, let the lady have the book," said she, interceding as earnestly and calmly as was possible for her at so critical a moment. "On reading it she will be convinced that she was overhasty in suspecting the little box of holding jewelry of any sort."
The steel-gray eyes fell with their first gleam of distrust upon her countenance; it was as though she had been stabbed by a knife; she blushed crimson, and cast down her eyes.
"So you join in her request, do you?" asked he, sharply and sarcastically. "There is something here at stake, more than mere sentimental stuff! Besides, I remember that my cousin affirmed just now that you had a very anxious look, and I confess that I made the same remark. In my turn, I ask you now on your conscience: what does that book contain?"
This was a dreadful moment. Felicia struggled with herself: she opened her lips, but not a sound escaped them. " Do not trouble yourself!" said he, smiling ironically upon the young girl, while he tightened his hold upon his cousin's hand, since she was going through various manipulations, in order gradually to make her escape. "You can be pitiless, rough, and abominably candid, but lie you cannot. The book then contains no poems, but some truth, a deed of which I am to be kept ignorant at any price. Finally, Adele, will you have the kindness to hand over my property, as you yourself denominated it?"
"Do with me what you will, but get it you never shall!" exclaimed the lady with desperate resolve, in her distress entirely dropping her part of the playfully pleading child. Several times she made desperate efforts to break away and finally succeeded; she flew as though the witches were after her; but there stood Henry with outspread arms and legs, firm as a rock, completely filling up the narrow passage. She recoiled. "You bold-faced man, get out of my way!" she screamed, stamping her foot in a perfect fury.
"Yes, certainly, directly, madame," replied he, quietly and politely, without however in the least changing his posture; "only hand over that little book, and I will gladly step aside."
"Henry," cried Felicia, bounding forward; as with despairing energy she shook at his arm.
"Ah, it shall avail you nothing, little Fay!" grinned he, as his old bones, with iron-like rigidity, stood firm against the faint exertions of the exhausted girl. "I am not such a dunder-head as you think. Out of pure good nature you would go against your own interests, and I'll not allow it!"
"Let the lady pass, Henry!" was the professor's grave command. "But take notice, Adele, I herewith warn you that I shall without further ceremony avail myself of the only means left for the restitution of my property! No one can persuade me that this book does not contain important revelations concerning my aunt's bequests—possibly it gives information as to the whereabouts of that missing silver."
"No, no!" asseverated Felicia, interrupting him.
 It is my affair to think what I choose," answered he sternly and inflexibly, "and you as well as Henry will witness for me, before the court, that this lady has purloined perhaps a very considerable part of a bequest made my family."
The young widow started up, as though she had been stung by an adder. She cast a wild look upon her relentless torturer, and now there came over her one of those fits of passion, in which she would tear up pocket-handkerchiefs and break china cups. She snatched the book out of her pocket, and threw it at his feet, with a loud peal of mocking laughter.
"There, take it, you hard-headed fool!" she cried, and her whole body trembled, as though she were shaken by convulsions. "I congratulate you upon your splendid acquisition!   May you bear the shame, of which it will tell you, with dignity!"
She flew through the corridor, down-stairs and into her chamber, slamming the door violently behind her.
The professor looked after his cousin with a decided expression of smiling disdain and utter contempt; then he considered for a moment the coarse exterior of the book, while Felicia's eyes hung in speechless anxiety upon the fingers that inserted themselves between the leaves, and might open them  at any   minute.    A  commingling  of anxious thought and suspense was depicted upon his features—the last pregnant words of the widow had not struck him particularly, he had evidently suspected some revelation of this sort from what had gone before; what he was concerned to know, was the character of this predicted shame.    Suddenly he looked up and into the young girl's pleading brown eyes—what a power did those eyes exert over the stern man!    It was as though a soft hand had been passed gently over that darkly furrowed brow, and smoothed out every fold, and a half smile actually hovered about the lips.
"And now I am going to call you into court!" he began. "You have deceived me shamefully. While you were standing before me up there, with a candor to which I could have sworn, you had a family secret of the Hellwigs in your pocket! What am I to think of you, Fay? You can only atone to me for this abominable double-dealing by answering my questions without reserve."
"I will tell you all that I can; but then I implore you, I beg you most fervently, to give me back that book.'"
"Is that actually my proud, defiant, unbending Fay who can beg so sweetly?"
At these words of the professor's, Henry quietly and discreetly withdrew; but, shocked to death, sat down on the bottom step and clutched his old gray head to ascertain, after what he had heard, whether he were indeed himself and sitting in the same old place.
''You made your way into the attic today, then, for the express purpose of fetching away this book?" queried the professor.
"Yes."
"By what way? I found all the doors fast locked."
"I crossed over the roofs," she answered, with hesitation.
"That is to say, through the rooms on the top story?'' 
She turned crimson. If she were freed from the suspicion of a mean action, this one still bore the stamp of burglary.
"No," said she, with depressed voice, "there is no way through the rooms on the top story. I climbed out of one of the garret windows opposite, and crossed over the roofs."
"In this fearful storm!"   continued he, turning pale. "Felicia, you are dreadful in your acts of contumacy!" 
"No choice was left me!" replied she, smiling bitterly.
 "And why did you seek at such a risk to gain possession of this book?"
"I regarded it as a sacred debt due Aunt Cordelia’s memory. She had told me that the little gray box m die before her—its contents I did not know. Now, death surprised her, and I was firmly persuaded that the box had not been destroyed. Moreover, it was in her secret drawer that contained all her silverware, the hiding-place of which I could not reveal without giving up the book into improper hands."
"Poor, poor child, how you must have tortured yourself! And now, all this heroic sacrifice has been for naught, seeing that the book has fallen at last into improper hands."
"Oh, no!   You will give it back to me!" pleaded she in anguish.
"Felicia!" said he gravely and imperiously.     "You will answer me two more questions in a manner strictly formable to truth: Do you know precisely the contents of this volume?"
"Partly, from today." 
"And do they compromise your old friend?" She held a doubtful silence.    If she answered this question in the affirmative perhaps he would restore the book to her for the purpose of destruction, but then she would defame her aunt's memory and confirm belief in those horrible reports concerning her supposed guilt.
"It is unworthy of you to invent subterfuges, let design be good and pure as possible!" said he sternly, interrupting this momentary silence. "Say simply, yes or no!"
"No!"
"I knew it," murmured he. "And now be reasonable," exhorted he, "and submit to the inevitable, for I will read the book!"
She turned pale as death, but she no longer resorted to entreaty. "Do so, if it comports with your honor!" gasped she. "You lay hands upon a secret that it was not meant for you to know. The moment that you open that volume you take it upon yourself to annul and make void a woman's whole life-time of dreadful and long-continued sacrifices!"
"You battle bravely, Fay," he calmly retorted, " and had it not been for those last words flung at me by that lady"—he pointed in the direction where the young widow had disappeared—"in her fury, I would give back to you, unseen, this bad secret. But I must and shall know the shame which attaches to my name, and if that solitary old lady in the attic was strong enough to guard it from the public, then shall I too find strength to bear its weight. I am under a twofold constraint to sift the matter to the bottom. The line of Hellwig on the Rhine is evidently in possession of the secret, and possibly has taken some part in an act of knavery. Although you are silent and look down, I see plainly from your face that my suspicions are correct. My cousin assuredly knew about this family scandal, and was only shocked at suddenly discovering it to be recorded in writing. I shall settle with that hypocrite! Comfort yourself, Fay!" he continued tenderly, softly stroking with his hand the crown of the maiden's head, as she still stood there before him in mute despair. "I cannot act otherwise, and although for a reward of yielding, the assurance were given me that you would forthwith be mine, I should still have to say 'No.' "
"I can never be content again," cried she, in an outburst of lamentation, " for I have made you unhappy through my heedlessness!"
"You will be content, though," said he, gravely and emphatically, "when you have learned by experience that your love helps me to surmount every difficulty that life may have in store for me."
He squeezed her little ice-cold hand, and passed on to his own room. But Felicia pressed her burning forehead against the window-glass and stared down upon the front yard, where a terrific thunder-storm was pouring down torrents of rain with as much vehemence as though the question in hand were to wash away from the pavement-stones the blood of the murdered Adrian von Hirschsprung, and with it the stain which rested upon the name of Hellwig.
CHAPTEE XXVI.
ONE hour later the professor entered his mother's drawing-room. The color of his complexion was a shade whiter than usual, but his bearing and expression of face bore the impress of that manly decision of character and moral power which made his appearance so imposing.
Mrs. Hellwig sat behind her asclepias-bush and knitted. The professor laid a little book open on the table behind which she sat.
"I have to talk with you in regard to a very serious affair," said he, "but I must first ask you to glance at these pages."
She laid down her knitting in astonishment, and took up the book. "Hey, this is some of that old Cordelia's scribbling!" ejaculated she crossly; but she began to read.
The professor put one hand behind his back, and with the other stroked his beard incessantly as he paced up and down the floor.
"I do not know why I should be expected to take any interest in this childish love affair between her and the shoe-maker's son!" cried the big woman indignantly, after she had skimmed over two pages. "What put it into your head to bring this old trash to me, which poisons the whole room with its smell of mold?"
"Read on, mother!" cried the professor, impatiently. "You will soon forget the smell of mold in other bad things that the book savors of."
She took it up with visible reluctance, and skipped over a few leaves. But gradually a look of intense interest came over that stony face; the rustling pages flew ever faster through her fingers. A faint flush suffused her white cheeks, mounted to her forehead, and suddenly deepened into crimson. Strangely, though, it was neither fright nor horror that took hold of this woman. With unbounded astonishment, in which utterable scorn very soon mingled she let the book fall into her lap.
"Remarkable things, these! Well, well, who would have thought it? The honorable, respectable family of the Hellwigs!" cried she, clapping her hands together. In her voice hatred, triumph, and gratified malice contended with one another. "So the money-bags that gave my proud mother-in-law consequence were stolen on shares. Hey, hey! what a rustling of satin and silk there used to be. What feasts they gave: where champagne flowed like water, and flatterers proclaimed the mistress of the house charming and witty! And I—I had to wait upon these merry-makers; and, in comparison with that vain, frivolous woman, nobody took any notice of the poor young relation, who, in her virtue and godliness, stood high above those bold-faced sinners. How often have I clinched my teeth, and secretly prayed to my God to send down His judgments upon these evil-doers. He had already judged them. Oh, how wonderful are His ways! Lo and behold! it was stolen money that they were squandering away. Their souls are doubly lost!"
The professor stood still, confounded, in the middle of the room. He had so little foreseen that she would view the case in this aspect that for an instant he was dumbfounded.
"How you can make my grandmother responsible for having ignorantly made use of these ill-gotten gains, I do not understand, mother," said he, with roused spirit, after a brief pause. "In that case, our souls are lost too, for we have lived in the enjoyment of the income derived from them up to the present day. As for the rest, according to your view of it, you will be all the more likely to agree with me, that we must rid ourselves as speedily as possible of this sinfully obtained money, and give it back to its rightful owners, penny for penny."
So far, in her unbounded astonishment, Mrs.  Hellwig had kept her seat, and simply clapped her hands: now she supported them on the arms of her chair, and started up with a jerk.
"Give it back!" repeated she, as though she doubted whether she had rightly understood him.     "To whom, then?"
"Why, to the Hirschsprung heirs, of course, if any such exist."
"How? pay out this enormous sum, I suppose, to any strolling vagabond or day-laborer who may come along and claim to be of their blood? Yes, forty thousand dollars remained in the Hellwig family after—"
"Yes, after Paul Hellwig, that honorable man, that blatant professor of religion, that undeniable heir of the kingdom of heaven, had abstracted for his own use twenty thousand dollars!" interrupted the professor, trembling from indignation. "Mother, you sentence my grandmother to eternal perdition because she unwittingly profited by stolen riches! What does he deserve who, with devilish deliberation and calculation, stole a fortune from his neighbor?"
"Yes, he fell for the time before temptation," answered she, without losing her self-possession in the least. "He was then an unreflective young man, who had not found the right path—the devil picks out the choicest, noblest spirits, to lure away from the service of God; but he has extricated himself from the slough of sin, and it is written: 'There is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth.' He is an indefatigable defender of the true faith—that money has been atoned for, and become sanctified in his hands, for he uses it to accomplish ends well pleasing to the Lord!"
"We Protestants have our Jesuitical orders, as I perceive!" laughed the professor in unspeakable bitterness.
"The case is exactly the same with what came to our house," continued the big woman immovably. "Look around and see if God's hand does not visibly rest on all we do and undertake! If sin cleave still to that money, it could not produce such glorious fruits. We, you and I, my son, have changed into blessing what was once a crime, through our zeal for the service of the Lord, through our godly walk and conversation."
"I pray you, mother, leave me umnentioned!" interrupted he, utterly disgusted by this perversion of holy truths. He pressed his hand to his forehead, in a manner that betokened both mental and physical pain.
A venomous glance was shot at the protesting son, but none the less did the fanatical woman continue her tirade in an elevated voice. ''We are not empowered to throw away means by which we may aid a holy cause, in order that, in all likelihood, they be expended in worldly enjoyments. That is the main reason which shall make me set my face like a flint against a raking up of these old, forgotten tales—the second is, that you disgrace one of your ancestors."
"He disgraced himself and all of us with him!" said the professor, bluntly and sadly. "But we can at least save our honor, while we scorn to become the receivers of stolen goods."
Mrs. Hellwig left her corner by the window, and rose up before her son, in all the ascendency of her superior strength and dignity.
"Good. Let us suppose that I were to give up to you in this bad business," said she, coldly. "We should then take these forty thousand dollars, the loss of which, by the way, would reduce us to a family of moderate means; but we will pass that by for the present. I say then, suppose we took this money and gave it back, how now if the laughing heirs should demand the interest and compound interest, which have been accumulating all these years— what then?"
"I do not believe that they would be justified in so doing; but even if it were the case, then you must remember that it is also written: 'I will visit the sins of the fathers upon the children.’"
"I am not a born Hellwig: do not forget that, my son!" she interrupted him, cuttingly. "I brought with me into this house an unblemished, highly respected name. My father was counselor to his prince. Upon me, then, this shame does not fall; just as little am I minded to make any pecuniary sacrifice with a view to obliterating this stain. Do you suppose that I am going to starve in my old age for the sake of somebody else's sin?"
''Starve, when you have a son who is able to take care of you? Mother, do you not believe that, with all I have learned, I can make your old age comfortable and free from care?"
"Thank you, my son!" said she, frigidly; "but I prefer to live upon my income, and remain my own mistress. I hate dependence. Since your father's death, I have known no will than that of the Lord and my own—so let it be. But is it not true that we are disputing over trifles? I declare to you, now, that I regard this whole tale as a figment of that crazy old creature's brain, who must have spent her days inventing them.    Nothing in the world will force me to recognize them as true and having actually happened!" At this instant the door was noiselessly opened, and the young widow entered.    The pretty woman had been weeping, but not, this time, in the mater dolorosa style—the traces of tears were plainly visible on her reddened eyelids, and dark spots glowed upon the soft velvet of her cheeks. It was not to be denied but that passion had roughly shaken this soul, although nothing had been overlooked, on the l lady's side, that could give a character of injured innocence to these incontestable witnesses of past emotion.    In order to hide the disordered state of her hair, she had thrown an airy white tulle scarf around her head, that lent a misty softness to the outlines of that ideally beautiful head, with its wealth of light blonde curls, that escaped so artlessly from its circumjacent drapery.    At all events, great pains had been taken to resume, once more, the character of sweet girlishness and naive simplicity that she had borne so long.
She saw that mysterious book lying on the table and shuddered. Slowly, like a penitent, she drew near to the professor, and, with bashfully averted face, held out to him her hand—he declined to give her his.
"Forgive me, John," she pleaded.    "Ah! I was so impetuous that I cannot answer to myself for it!   I, who have always been so calm and even in my temper, how could I fall into such a passion!   But that wretched story must bear all the blame of it!    Only think, John, my dear papa is compromised by the statements of that wretched book, and then I wanted, at any cost, to save you the pain of a crushing discovery.    I cannot help it, but I must always think that Caroline trumped up this abominable testimony in order to play us a mischievous trick before going off for good."
"Hold your slanderous tongue!" cried he, in a threatening manner, and starting up so passionately that she was silenced by fright. "As for the rest, I will forgive you," added he after a pause, during which he sought to calm himself, "but only on one condition." 
She looked at, him inquiringly.
"That you tell me, without any reserve whatever, how you have come into the possession of this secret."
For one moment she held her peace, but then began dejectedly: "In papa's last sickness, which, as you know, seemed to take a fatal turn, he asked me to bring him out of his secretary various papers. I had to destroy them before his eyes; they were Hirschsprung documents, which he had apparently kept as curiosities. Either the apparent nearness of death made him more communicative, or somehow, he felt the necessity of speaking, for once, about the past—enough—he confided in me."
"And made you a present of a certain bracelet, did he not?" interposed the professor, grimly.
She nodded silently and looked at him with an air of entreaty that seemed to plead for pity.
"After this declaration, do you still deem the whole affair as the figment of a diseased brain?" said he, turning to his mother.
"I only know that this person," and she pointed angrily at her niece, "in folly and vanity exceeds anything that I ever came across in my life," answered Mrs. Hellwig. "But there is that devil of vanity that gives one possessed of it no rest, so that she must needs go parading about a rare bracelet, just for people to admire the pretty white arm it clasped!"
The young widow now left her part of the mourning penitent, and hurled a wild look of fury at her aunt, who thus suddenly exposed one of her weakest points.
"I will not discuss further, Adele, the propriety of a person who boasts, as you do on every occasion, of an immaculate parity and innocence of soul, condescending to wear stolen jewelry!" said the professor with apparent composure, although there was something in his voice that portended a brewing storm. "It is for yourself to decide whether the rich, elegant lady, who is rolling in wealth, and caressingly clings to a stolen bauble, is not more deserving of punishment than the poor mother who steals bread for her hungry children. That you could have the front, with great ostentation, to lay this trophy of guilt in the pure hand of the girl who had saved your child's life—at the same time declaring emphatically that you prized the bracelet highly, but for Anna's sake would most joyfully make any sacrifice—that you, moreover, dared, knowing your father's deed, to arrogate to yourself all the advantages of a noble ancestry and the virtues inherited through pure blood, and throw contumely upon this maiden and-her progenitors, from your lofty standpoint—this is a revolting feature in your conduct, which cannot be too strictly judged!"
The young widow tottered, closed her eyes, and caught at the edge of the table with unsteadily groping hands in order to save herself from falling.
"Well, you are not wholly wrong, John," said Mrs. Hellwig as she shook her trembling niece violently by the arm, as if to arouse her (fainting women were her horror); you are not entirely wrong, but your last expression, sounds a little too strong! Infinitely silly it was, of course, but you must not, on that account, forget what is due to one in Adele's station of life. That comparison with the poor woman was (do not take it ill of me) a little absurd. There is a considerable difference between finding property that its owner has lost, and deliberately stealing bread. But this too is another of those abominable new-fangled ideas, by which common people and the nobly born are put upon precisely the same level; it does chill me mightily to hear such things issuing from your mouth. Just so it is inexcusable in a girl like Caroline to presume to put herself on an equality with a lady of rank, such a servant-maid—"
"Mother, once before today I assured you that I would not suffer these unpardonable attacks upon the honor of the person whom you are pleased to speak of so disrespectfully!" exclaimed the professor, and again the veins in his forehead were swollen with anger.
"Oho! more self-control and respect, my son, if I may ask it! Do you undertake to instruct your mother?" said she imperiously, while she waved him back and darted a withering glance at him from her cold, gray eyes. "You perform admirably the part of knight to this errant princess; of course nothing will be left me but to lay my homage at her feet!"                                                                         
"You will certainly have to learn to treat her with respect, mother," answered he with great composure, in reply to her sarcastic speech, at the same time fastening his penetrating eyes firmly upon her face—" for—she will be my wife!" And that unheard-of thing was really so; and the stately old house was still standing after its announcement; and the earth did not open to swallow up the little city that held the most misguided of all the Hellwigs, as that great woman supposed that it would in the first shock of her overwhelming surprise. He himself stood there cool and collected, the picture of a man who has made up his mind, and against whom the tears, convulsions, and outbursts of woman's passion strike as impotently as do the waves of ocean against the rock-girt shore.
Mrs. Hellwig had fallen back in her chair dumfounded; but her niece roused herself from her half fainting fit and burst into an hysterical fit of laughter. The glorifying cloud fell from her head down upon her neck, and the disordered curls (among which still hung, half withered, the crimson rose of this afternoon) circled like vipers around her reddened forehead.
"You see now what comes of your boasted wisdom, aunt!" cried she, fairly yelling. "Now I can triumph! Who was it that begged you, by fair or foul means, to marry that girl off before John got here? At the first glimpse I had of that person I had a strong foreboding that she would be the ruin of us all. Take upon your own shoulders, now, the disgrace against which you have willfully blinded yourself! But I shall set off directly for Bonn, and let the professors' wives know what sort of associate is to be shortly introduced into their select circle."
She rushed out of the door.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Hellwig had recovered from her stupefaction. She girded herself about with all her fancied superiority and outward dignity.
"I certainly misunderstood you just now, John," said she, with a great effort to appear composed.
"If you think so, I will repeat my announcement," replied he, coldly and unyieldingly. "I am going to marry Felicia d'Orlowsky."
"You dare adhere to that mad fancy in my presence?"
"Instead of any answer, I ask you: would you still add your blessing to a marriage with Adele?"
"Most assuredly I would. She would be a suitable match. I have no greater wish."
The professor grew very red in the face; it might be observed that he clinched his teeth to restrain himself from breaking forth into a torrent of reproach.
"By this declaration you have lost the last vestige of a right to prescribe for me in the most important step that can be taken in life," he said from between his teeth, with difficulty bridling himself in. "It does not concern you at all, then, that this utterly depraved creature, this miserable hypocrite, might poison my whole life. You would sit coolly here in your handsome house and be perfectly satisfied to say of your absent son that he had made a suitable match. In face of this unbounded egotism, I here declare that I will be happy, cost what it may, and that I can be so only with this poor despised orphan, whom we once so cruelly maltreated."
Mrs. Hellwig burst into a rude fit of mocking laughter.
"I still forbear to use my last weapon!" cried she, with quivering lips. "Do not forget that children's houses are built up by a father's blessing, but brought to naught by a mother's curse."
"Would you assert that your blessing could wash away Adele's moral delinquencies? Just as little can a curse take effect upon the head of the innocent. You will not utter it, mother! God will not hear it; it will return upon your own head and make your old age desolate and void of love."
"What care I for that? There are only two things to which I hold; my rules of conduct are: honor and disgrace! You have to respect my will, and by virtue of this duty you will recall your insane sentence!"
"Never! you may rely upon that, mother!" called back the professor as he left the room, while she stood, motionless as a statue,-with outstretched arms. And did those bloodless, distorted lips pronounce that curse? Not a sound made its way to the entrance-hall, so that if it were spoken, it fell unheeded by any mortal ear; the God of love gives not so horrible a tool into the hands of the wicked and revengeful!
Through the great quadrangle of the front court-yard the shadows of starlight were already flitting. The storm had spent itself, but dark, ragged-looking clouds were chasing-each other over the face of the sky, as though angry at being left behind. They were holding out their giant arms to overtake and embrace those gone before, that they might rush down as a combined force.
On the first floor doors were being slammed, trunks drawn out, while feet, both clumsy and nimble, ran up and down—a great packing up was going on, for somebody was to leave, never to return.
"And so we have seen the end of the little forget-me-not flower," muttered Henry to himself with heartfelt satisfaction, as he trudged across the front hall under the burden of a heavy trunk.
Contrasted with the stir and bustle in the front part of the house, how sweet and placid looked the face of the pale maiden sitting in the great bow window in the basement that opened on the yard. A kitchen lamp was burning on the table, and by it stood the little trunk that had held Felicia's wardrobe when a child. Mrs. Hellwig, looking up from her knitting about an hour ago, had issued her orders from her usual retreat in the window, that  the girl's plunder should be delivered up to her, that no excuse might be left her for passing another night under that roof. Felicia was just holding up to the light her little breastpin with the Hirschsprung coat of arms upon it, when the professor's pale face appeared at the window.
"Come, Felicia! Not a second longer shall you stay in this house of crime and infinite selfishness," said he, with deep emotion. " Meanwhile, leave your things here. Henry will take them all to you tomorrow."
She threw her shawl around her, and immediately joined the professor in the front hall. He clasped her hand firmly within his own, and led her through the streets. He rang at the house of the Aulic councilor, Francke.
Mrs. Francke received the pair cordially, but with surprise, in her brightly lighted, cheerful sitting-room. The professor approached the old lady, seized her hand, and as he laid the young girl's in it, said significantly, "I am trusting a great deal to you, dear madame; guard and protect Felicia for me as you would a daughter until I claim her again at your hands."
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE young girl had only gone through a few streets, and crossed the thresholds of two doors; but what a revolution, inwardly and outwardly, had those few steps effected! The strong walls of the spacious old merchant's house lay behind her, and with them the pressure of undeserved degradation. In whatever direction she looked forward it was bright and sunny; there met her not the slightest touch of that gloomy fanaticism which like a dismal bird of prey hovered over the Hellwig mansion, seeking to clutch with its talons every unwary soul of man that came within reach. A free, healthy view of life as it is, a lively interest in all that makes the world bright and happy, with a cheerful, affectionate home-circle, were the characteristics of the house in which she was now a welcome guest. Felicia felt as if she had found her native element. It gave her a sweet, melancholy feeling suddenly to hear herself once more addressed by all the endearing names that Aunt Cordelia had applied to her; she had forthwith become the darling of both Mr. and Mrs. Francke.
So much for the outward change in her circumstances; she herself remained in sweet perplexity as to the change which was being wrought in her inner being. When the professor had summoned her that evening, without a question she had left her little possessions behind her; in the front hall she had silently nestled her little hand in his and gone with him, not knowing whither. And if he had gone further through the dark streets and out at the gate, she would have gone with him on pilgrimages through the whole wide world without a word of contradiction or doubt. She was a rare creature, this Felicia, who, with all her fiery imagination and enthusiastically soaring mind, yet inexorably demanded a firm basis for all her actions. The professor's fervent assurances of love, his eager pleadings, had rent her heart, but they had been far from shaking her resolution and effecting an entire change of purpose. Something quite different from this must needs be spoken for the winning of this girl, and this the professor had done without being at all conscious of it. He had said, on refusing to return the book to her: " I cannot act otherwise, and if, as a reward for yielding, the assurance were given me that you would forthwith be mine, I should be obliged to say 'no.’'' 
In spite of the distressed situation in which she had then been placed her heart had still leaped for joy, the strength of manly determination, the emphasis with which he had refused to be bribed at any price, these things were what solved the question for her, and gave her that trust in him, without which, she could never have united herself to any man.
The professor called every day at Mr. Francke's. He was graver and more reserved than ever, for many burdens rested upon him. Sojourn in his mother's house had become intolerable to him. Apparently, the continued and unwonted excitement of the last few weeks had had their shattering influence even upon that stout lady's iron nerves, for she fell sick and had to keep her bed. It is true that she persistently refused to see her son; Dr. Bohm's medical attendance had been solicited, but nevertheless her sickness forced the professor to stay at X------.    Meanwhile he had initiated young Mr. Francke into the family secret, as proxy for the Hirschsprung heirs, and expressed to him the firm resolve of making atonement for the injustice.    All the plans which his friend could suggest from a legal point of view, whereby, at least, his contemplated sacrifice might be lessened, were responded to by the professor with the direct question: "Do you think that money was honestly come by?" and to this the lawyer himself could not say, "Yes."   As for the rest, the lawyer quite agreed with Mrs. Hellwig, that they were disputing about a mare's-nest, although, for that matter, from an entirely different point of view, because he did not believe at all in the existence of the Hirschsprung heirs. But according to his judgment, the canting hypocrite on the Rhine, the highly respected Mr.  Paul Hellwig, ought not to be spared a comfortable shaking of the nerves, and so a summons was sent him to hand over the purloined thirty thousand dollars.    That pious individual calmly replied, with his wonted fluency of speech, that he had assuredly gotten this sum from his uncle, as indemnity for an old family debt, since his father had been defrauded by the main branch of the Hellwig family.   Whence his uncle got that money had been a matter of total indifference to him, and occasioned him not the smallest scruple now—it was none of his affair.   The money was in the best hands; he did not consider himself at all as the possessor of his own property, but as a steward and actual deputy of the Lord.    From this reason, if no other, he should know how to defend himself with all his might, and would cheerfully abide the issue of a lawsuit.
Nearly in the same fashion answered Nathanael, the student.    It was "all one" to him what an old progenitor(long since a skeleton) had been guilty of so many, many years ago—he did not account himself bound to wash other people's sins white, and would not consent to having his fortune curtailed to the amount of a penny. He likewise awaited a lawsuit in all tranquillity of spirit, as he wrote, .and was even now enjoying, by anticipation, the moment when those presumptive heirs would be paying the costs, and his crack-brained brother throwing his highly estimable name into the bargain.
"There is nothing left for me, then," said the professor, smiling bitterly, as he threw down upon the table this written testimony to the Hellwig sense of honor, "but to sacrifice all that I possess both by inheritance and my own exertions, if I would not be the receiver of stolen goods and accessory to a crime."
And now the close of the holidays gradually drew near. Mrs. Hellwig was again out of bed, but had positively declared that she would only see her son again on one condition, that he would give up altogether prosecuting that wretched Hirschsprung nonsense, and renounce his intention of marrying Felicia, else mother and son must part forever.
Felicia was in a mood that it was hard to describe. All the time that she was in Francke's house, at a certain hour of the afternoon she sat at the window with beating heart and cast stolen glances out upon the street—then at last would come around the corner a manly muscular form, with full beard and quiet demeanor. Every time it required a strong exertion of self-control on the young girl's part to keep her from jumping up and running into the street to meet him. Then he would come nearer and nearer, looking neither to the right hand nor the left, and paying no head to the passers-by; his looks were riveted upon the window, behind which a girlish figure was to be seen bending over some needle-work; at last the minute had come when she might look up—their four eyes met. Ah! the cup of life did indeed contain a superfluity of happines never before dreamed of by this young heart! The pro lessor, to be sure, never spoke a syllable of his love, and Felicia might have supposed that recent events had quite cast this feeling into the background, had it not been for his eyes; but those deep, expressive eyes followed her ever moment, and would flash with light if she did but enter the room or turn her face fully toward him. She knew that she was still "his Fay," who "was to wait for him and think of him at home," and in this way she received him, too, upon his afternoon visits. The girl who had once been so frigid, with eyes flashing hatred and cold repulsive manner, did not know what a magical charm her very presence now possessed, seeing that all the asperities and angularities of her sorely tried character had melted away, and she had developed into the sweet-spirited and loving woman.
But a day must soon come when she would have to sit at the window and look for him in vain. In that ever-longed-for afternoon hour he would he already far, far away from her, numberless strange faces intervening between him and his Fay. May be a long interminable year would go by ere she should see him again; what sort of a time would that be which was to come now? Felicia looked into a barren, desolate space, where she could no longer place herself at all. She had lost her rudder.
On the day before that on which the professor was to take his departure, the Francke family and Felicia sat at the lunch-table, when the waitress entered and handed the young lawyer a card. A flush of sharp surprise colored his face; he threw the card on the table and went out. On the little satin-smooth white leaflet was inscribed, "Lutz von Hirschsprung, owner of the baronial estate at Kiel."
Out in the front hall a manly voice was speaking in soft, gentlemanly tones and polished German; then the two gentlemen went up into the lawyer's office.
While the married pair were deep in an exchange of thought as to the likelihood of one of the fabulous Hirschsprung heirs having actually appeared, Felicia sat by silently in great agitation of mind. The poor conjurer's child, who, loosened from every family tie, had hitherto stood solitary in the midst of strangers, suddenly found herself under the same roof with a blood relation. Was he her grandfather, or her mother's brother? Had that calm, earnest voice out there, whose sound had thrilled the maiden through and through, once pronounced that curse upon the recreant daughter of the proud Von Hirsch-sprungs?
The gentleman had the exact name of Mm who had branched off first from the parent stock. That almost antediluvian-sounding name looked very aristocratic, as it was rather ostentatiously displayed upon that stylish card. How the fashionable world loves to rake among the garrets for names of the mighty ones of past centuries; they involuntarily call up before us a knightly figure clad in clanking armor, and remind us that the present generation claim the same noble blood, if they do make rather a strange figure when applied to the pigmy specimens of modern drawing-rooms in their black frock-coats.
This branch of the Hirschsprung family evidently thought a great deal of their ancestry; hence it might be almost positively predicated that the conjurer's daughter could not, with impunity, let her relationship be known. At the thought of being repelled by him, every drop of blood in Felicia's body boiled; she closed her lips firmly lest inadvertently she might utter some rash word that might escape her possibly in her excitement. At the same time, she could not suppress a vehement desire to see this man, and an opportunity for this was to be allowed her.
Soon after the stranger's arrival, the lawyer had sent for the professor. The conference between the three gentlemen lasted for over two hours. During this season of keen suspense, Felicia often heard the professor's footsteps as he paced the floor in his habitual manner. In spirit she saw how the man of science was calmly stroking his beard with his prettily formed slender hand, as he quietly offered the aristocrat money and land to redeem the honor of his name.
Later, young Francke sent a request to his mother that she would have coffee served, as he would like to offer his visitor some refreshment in the drawing-room. Felicia attended to making the needful preparations, and while she was still in the kitchen, seeing about the coffee-service, she heard the gentlemen come down-stairs. Her courage was well-nigh giving way as she saw the stranger cross the hall in earnest conversation with the professor. His figure was thin and almost too tall, while in bearing and gesture he was the polished man of the world, but also, evidently, the haughty aristocrat, well aware of the importance given him by his station in life. Her grandfather the stranger could not be by any means, for the finely chiseled, very small head, with its closely shorn brown hair, was much too young. At this moment, indeed, an obliging smile played around his thin, pinched lips, as he nodded over at the professor, but that handsome face, with its sharply cut features and sallow complexion, was evidently better practiced in the expression of masterful than amiable, kindly feelings.
With trembling hands Felicia smoothed back her hair and entered the room, after the waitress had handed in the coffee-tray. Those present were all standing in one of the large bow-windows, and had their backs turned upon the gentle new-comer. She noiselessly filled the cups, took a waiter and offered one to the stranger, with a few polite words; he turned sharply at the sound of her voice, but immediately started back with pallid countenance, looking as if he had received a stab, while his horrified eyes scanned the maiden's figure.
"Meta!" he gasped.
"Meta von Hirschsprung was my mother!" said the young girl with her deep, melodious voice, apparently very calm, bat she set her waiter upon a table because the cups began to clatter threateningly.
"Your mother!—I did not know that she had left a child," murmured Mr. von Hirschsprung, while he tried to recover his self-command.
Felicia smiled bitterly and contemptuously, partly, indeed, at her own weakness, by which she had been carried away in spite of all her good resolutions, so far as to confess her origin to this man. In his exclamation of horror and surprise mingled not one tone of love or tender compassion. She immediately felt as though she had invited a series of humiliations, which she must now submit to and endure, as best she might, in the presence of by-standers, who, speechless from astonishment, awaited some further revelations after this remarkable opening.
Meanwhile Herr von Hirschsprung had recovered from his shock, only, however, to fall into a painful embarrassment. He passed his hand over his eyes and said softly, and hesitatingly: "Yes, yes, quite right, this is the little town of X------where Nemesis overtook the unhappy girl—a terrible, but alas! a just Nemesis!"
It seemed as though with this exclamation he recovered full control over himself. He drew himself up to his full height, and said to the standers-by, with the distinguished ease of the perfect gentleman:
"Ah, pardon me, if, through a momentary impression, I allowed myself to forget that I was in company! But I had believed a family drama had been played out and forgotten long ago, when lo! I here come upon an unexpected afterpiece. So you are the daughter of the conjurer, D'Orlowsky, I think you said?" said he, turning to Felicia, evidently trying to infuse a tone of amiability into his voice.
"Yes," answered she briefly, and with dignity equal to his own. At this moment the family likeness between the two came out in the most striking manner. Pride was the predominant expression in the finely cut profiles of both, although, probably, a pride grounded upon entirely different bases.
"Your father left you behind at X——, did he not, after his wife's death? You have been brought up here?" asked he furthermore, evidently impressed by the girl's lofty bearing.
"Yes."
"To be sure, not much time was allowed the man in which to see after you—as well as I can remember, it was eight or nine years ago that he died at Hamburg, of nervous fever."
"I never heard, until this minute, that he was no longer living," answered Felicia, trembling, while the corners of her mouth twitched convulsively, and a tear came into her burning eye. But, in spite of her agitation, the news thus broken to her filled her with a sort of painful satisfaction. Mrs. Hellwig had often enough affirmed that her father was strolling about the world as a vagabond, congratulating himself that he had put off upon others the providing for his child.
"Ah, it grieves me to have been the medium of communicating this sad news to you," exclaimed Herr von Hirschsprung, wagging his head to and fro, in sign of commiseration. "To be sure, in him you have lost the only relation left you, after your mother's death. There was a time when I inquired into this man's antecedents; from early childhood he stood alone in the world. It is a sad fate; but there is not a member of your family left to you."
"And may I ask, Herr von Hirschsprung, in what relationship the mother of this young lady stood to your family?" asked the Aulic councilor's wife, indignant at the supercilious way in which he put Felicia entirely out of the pale of his own noble belongings.
His face flushed slightly. Charming as is a blush upon the cheeks of innocence, it affects us just as disagreeably upon the face of a haughty man, whom we see obviously struggling as to whether he shall or shall not conceal from us something humiliating.
"She was once my sister," answered he with unfeeling voice, but sharply accentuating the word "once." "I purposely avoided allusion to that relationship," continued he after quite a long pause; " since, as matters now stand. I should have been forced to make revelations that might have been unpleasant to this young lady, and possibly put me into a false light. At the same moment that Mrs. D'Orlowsky gave her hand to that Pole, she ceased to be a member of the Hirschsprung family for all time to come. On our family-tree the name of her husband does not follow hers, as is customary—for my father himself struck her name off the roll, at the same time that she departed thus ignominiously from his house, although it cost him a far greater effort than if he had been called to affix the sign of decease to her name. Since then the name Meta von Hirschsprung has had no existence for us—not a friend of the family, nor servant, has dared to pronounce it in our presence; my children do not know that they had such an aunt, for she had been disowned, disinherited, and long dead to us, ere she ended her life in so horrible a manner."
He was silent for a moment. Mrs. Francke had thrown her arm around Felicia in an affectionate motherly manner, while her uncle was holding this cruel discourse. And there stood the professor—not speaking a word, but his kindling eye was riveted upon the marble features of the girl who was called once more to suffer so severely on behalf of her dead but idolized mother. There ensued a moment of painful stillness. A severe, sentence was unmistakably contained in this silence—even the speaker could not fail to imbibe this impression; hesitating, with unsteady voice, he continued: "Be assured that it is a very difficult task for me to have to hurt your feelings in this way—I appear to myself in such an unchivalric light, but—bless me, how can I help calling things by their true names! I would like to do something for you. In what capacity do I find you here in this honorable house?"
"As my dear daughter," answered Mrs. Francke, in Felicia's stead, giving him a firm and penetrating look.
"Well, I must congratulate you upon your fortunate destiny," said he to the young girl, while he bowed obligingly to the wife of the Aulic councilor. "Alas, that it is out of my power to emulate the example of your noble protrectress! I could not dare to grant you the rights of a daughter of the house, since my parents are still alive. Alas! in their eyes the circumstance of your bearing the name D'Orlowsky would forever exclude you from their presence."
"How, her own grandparents?" cried the old lady, with roused spirit. "Could they know of the existence of a grandchild and die without seeing her? You cannot make me believe such a thing!"
"My dear lady," replied Herr von Hirschsprung, smiling coldly, "that strongly marked aristocratical feeling, together with a scrupulous regard for the unspotted honor of their house, are family traits of the Hirschsprungs, from which I am not myself exempt. Among us love takes a second place. I perfectly understand my parents' way of looking at this matter, and would act precisely the same way if a daughter of mine should forget her obligations to her family."
"Well, let the men of your family think as they like on this point," said the old lady, obstinately; "but the grandmother—why, she must be a stone if she could hear of this child and not—"
"She is the least accessible of all," interposed the gentleman with assured superciliousness. "My mother dates her birth from several stocks of the ancient noblesse, and prizes purity of blood in a manner unusual for a woman. For that matter, honored madame," added he, not without a slight touch of irony, "you are at perfect liberty to make the experiment for yourself in behalf of your protegee. I assure you that not only would I not interpose any obstacle to your success, but would second you, so far as it might be possible."
"Oh! pray, not a word more!" cried Felicia, in unutterable agony, as she extricated herself from the old lady's arms and seized her hands beseechingly. "Accept my assurance, sir," said she, turning to Herr von Hirschsprung quietly and coolly, after a momentary pause, although she spoke with quivering lips, "that I shall never institute any claim founded upon my mother's former rights. She abandoned them for the sake of him whom she loved, and judging from all that you have just said, must have only been a gainer thereby. I have grown up in the belief that I stood alone in the world, and so repeat to myself now that I have no grandparents.''
"That sounds sharp and bitter," said he, slightly embarrassed. "But," added he, with a shrug of his shoulders, "as circumstances now are, I am necessitated to allow you to persist in this determination. As for the rest, I shall do for you what is in my power. I do not doubt for a moment but that I shall succeed in persuading my parents to grant you a considerable yearly income."
"I thank you!" interrupted she warmly: "I have just explained to you that I have no grandparents: how can you imagine that I would accept alms at the hands of strangers?"
Again he blushed, but this time it was the dark flush of shame, that perhaps for the first time had crept into the life of this highly aristocratical soul. In open embarrassment, he picked up his hat—nobody seeking to detain him. Turning to the lawyer, almost in a whisper, he again referred to business matters; then, as though moved by a sudden impulse, he offered Felicia his hand; but the young girl bowed deeply and ceremoniously to him, and let her hands drop slowly down on either side. The conjurer's child to cut the proud Baron von Hirschsprung! He started back, much shocked, and, with a shrug of his shoulders, for the time being bereft of all the prestige of his boasted rank, he bowed to the others, and left the room, attended by the young lawyer. 
When the door had closed behind him, with a passionate gesture, Felicia clapped her hands before her face.
"Fay!" cried the professor, spreading out his arms wide.
She looked up, and took refuge in them. Flinging her arms around his neck, she pressed her head firmly against his breast. The wild young bird had yielded for all time, never to make the slightest attempt to fly off again; it was sweet to be sheltered securely in those strong arms, after having, on solitary wing, contended with the fury of storm, and tempest, until almost beaten to death through her struggles.
Seeing this, good old Mrs. Francke, giving her husband smiling nod, both together left the room.
"I will, John!" exclaimed the young girl, lifting up eyelashes, upon which yet sparkled the tears that had so recently been called forth by the trying scene through which she had just passed.
"At last!" said he, drawing his arm more closely around her delicate form, as though he felt that, by that simple expression, she had been made his own.
What a commingling of warmth and tenderness did not those grave, deep eyes express as they looked down upon the smiling countenance of that radiant maiden!
"I have been waiting for this sentence of release from hour to hour," continued he. "Thank God that spoke it of your own impulse, otherwise I should have been forced to press for it this very evening; although I doubt it could then have sounded so sweet as it did just now! Bad Fay! to allow me to go through with such bitter experiences ere you could consent to make me happy!"
"No!" cried she decidedly, at the same time freeing herself. "Not the thought that your outward circumstances have changed has conquered me; but at the very moment when you so consistently refused to give back to me the book I felt myself suddenly inspired with confidence—"
"And a few minutes afterward, when the secret revealed to me," interposed he, again drawing her to his side, "I recognized that in spite of your coyness, in spite of your pride and self-reliance, you nevertheless had within you the germs of a genuine woman's love. You would rather submit to any suffering yourself than subject me to painful experiences. We have both gone through severe discipline; and do not deceive yourself, Fay, as to the task that must devolve upon you. I have lost my mother. My confidence in mankind in general has sustained a se shock. And this, too, must be said: at present I have hardly anything to depend upon but my profession!"
''Oh! how happy I am that I may stand by your side," interposed she, lightly laying her hand upon his mouth. "I cannot, indeed, hope to make up to you for all you have lost, but whatever the devotion of a loving woman can devise and execute to brighten the life of a noble man shall not be left undone."
"And when will those proud lips consent to pronounce those sweet vows at the altar?" asked he, looking down upon her with a beaming smile.
Her fair face colored to the very roots of her hair.
"Do not stay away from me too long, John!" whispered she, pleadingly.
"Ah! and so you seriously believed that I was going away without you?" exclaimed he, with a low laugh. "If it all had not come about so beautifully as it is, you should have learned, at all events, this evening that you were to accompany me to Bonn tomorrow, our dear friend, Mrs. Francke, having consented to matronize the party. The sweet old lady has been playing a little game all this time, my dear. Upstairs, in a spare room, there have been standing two ready-packed trunks ever since yesterday—I, under her direction, having selected everything that you will require, down to the little traveling-hat that is to adorn this refractory little head. You are to spend four weeks in the house of Mrs. von Berg as my fiancee, and then a little woman is to preside over the study of a grim professor, chasing away, by her smiles, sadness from his heart and moodiness from his brow."
*******
As representative of his still living father, Herr von Hirschsprung made out a legal claim to the property left his family by the Old Ma'm'selle, and it was accordingly delivered up to him. He declared the debt due by the Hellwigs to the Hirschsprungs to be entirely liquidated by the payment of sixty thousand dollars, that being the amount of the principal, in full. Aunt Cordelia having left thirty thousand dollars, the professor doubled it from his own private fortune.
Mrs. Hellwig had to pay down one thousand dollars in cash for the burning of the Bach operetta manuscript; she submitted to this grumblingly, because everybody assured her that a lawsuit would entail upon her yet greater losses.
"Why should I deny it?" said the young lawyer to the professor on the morning of departure, as they stood together in a window-niche, the latter standing ready equipped for his journey, waiting for the appearance of the ladies. "I envy you Felicia. I recognized her rare qualities the very first moment that my eyes fell upon her, and it will take me a long time to forget. But I have one consolation withal: she has made another man of you, and brought in a new convert to the inalienable right of every child of man to perfect itself to the utmost capacity of its nature. My free and certainly sound views of social polity could not have been more aptly illustrated—if you will pardon my allusion to the bitter truth—than by the heavy indebtedness of the proud Hellwigs to the family of the despised conjurer's child. Lo! there stand the one race looking haughtily down upon the other, and the blind world suspects not that their renowned institutions have false foundations, and that the fresh breezes of freedom are needful for blowing away the mists that favor haughtiness, heartlessness, and with these a whole series of the worst crimes."
"You are right, and I accede without the least demurring to the force of your conclusions; for I have indeed erred grievously," said the professor gravely. "It is true, too, that I have had a stony path to travel, but the difficulties of the way did but enhance the value of the prize for which I had to strive so earnestly."
*******
John Hellwig introduced his young wife into the exclusive circle of professors' wives, and his ideally beautiful companion was received with love and admiration, in spite of the slanderous stories circulated to her disadvantage by her husband's cousin. The picture which the professor had once pleased himself in fancying has become a sweet reality. When he returns home burdened with professional cares, Felicia's- smile is still all-powerful in its soothing influence, and never has he to ask in vain for "a song. Fay!" How different the effect of that rich alto voice now, from the time when it drove the professor forth from his mother's house into the Thuringian forests, whither he fled, to escape the irresistible fascination of that wonderful creature, the conjurer's daughter.
He has had all the furniture of the attic-home transferred to Bonn. The piano and busts, together with their rich drapery of ivy, now decorate Felicia's room. In the secret drawer to the glass press, that young housewife even now treasures up her store of costly old-fashioned silver plate; but the little gray box, with all its contents, was destroyed the very day that the Hirschsprungs had signed their receipt for the money due them. That debt has been expunged from the records, the wrong atoned for, in so far as human means extended, and Aunt Cordelia's spirit can, unimpeded, pursue that upward flight which it had begun, even here on earth.
Henry lives with the young married couple at Bonn. He is held in high honor and feels himself blessed beyond measure; but if on the street he meets a certain widow arrayed in velvet and satin, cut after the latest mode, she invariably looks away as if she had not seen the old man's honest face, although he invariably grins and mutters to himself in well satisfied tones: "That little forget-me-not flower did no good in the world, my lady!"
Some may be interested in learning that the said pretty woman could no longer use the bracelet to call attention to the perfection of her faultlessly rounded, alabaster arm, because her father had restored it to the Hirschsprung heirs, with the remark, that it had come into his possession by accident and through a mistake. He lives on very ill terms with his daughter, because she was guilty of the stupidity of testifying to his share in the robbery. The halo of piety and childish simplicity has long since ceased to gild her head, but she still engages in public works of charity with great ostentation, while her little Anna, committed entirely to the care of servants, filled an early grave. And how about that strait-laced believer on the Rhine? It is not to be expected that any judgment will overtake him in this world, because whatever calamity may befall him he will always style it "a trial tending to purification." We therefore commend him to the tribunal of public opinion, the punishment to which a hypocrite is most sensitive, since it tears off his mask in the presence of all!
Mrs. Hellwig may be found now, as ever, seated behind her asclepias-bush. Misfortune has at last invaded even her threshold, for she has lost both of her children. She disowned her son John, and one day came the tidings that Nathanael had fallen in a duel. He left behind him a great many debts and a very indifferent reputation. The stout woman's features have lost much of their rigidity, and it strikes many a one -that her head, once held so loftily erect, in the proud consciousness of innate superiority, now often, hangs right weariedly on her breast. A short while ago the professor had announced to her the birth of his first-born son. Since that time, in her work-basket, alongside of the coarse blue and white yarn which she was knitting up into stockings for some benevolent society has lain the daintiest little ball of rose-colored zephyr worsted, which Mrs. Hellwig, however, only works upon by stealth, when no inquisitive eyes are near. Fredericka coldly declares that this is no society-work, but "just the darlingest little" infant sock.
Whether this be really so, and these pretty little rosy things are destined to encircle the active limbs of the youngest member of the Hellwig family, we do not know; but for the honor of humanity, be it said, that no soul is so hardened as not to have one soft spot, one noble impulse, one sweet-toned string that must respond if rightly touched. Often indeed this inward treasure is held an unconscious possession, and if ever called into use, the key for unlocking it must be applied from outside. Who knows but the grandmother's love may prove such an unexpectedly potent touchstone, when applied to the heart of the stout woman, beneath the application of which its ice may melt and give place to the mild radiance of a warm, if tardy sunshine of love.
Let us hope so, dear reader!



