came into Aunt Rosamond's room. The old lady had just hung up Felix Leonhard's portrait again, after carefully making fast the broken cord.

"Well, who was right, Aunt Rose?" he asked. He was standing beside her, and she saw that his face had grown very red, and that his whole being was stirred.

"Right? In what, Klaus?"

"In your assertion about Anna Maria. She does not love him!"

"Did she say so? Oh, well, it doesn't follow at all that a girl has spoken the truth, if she says she does not love a certain person, does not even like him. I have experienced the contrary a hundred times; those who talk so hide a warm affection under cold words."

"Not this time, Aunt Rose. Anna Maria has definitely refused him!"

The old lady sank, quite overcome, into the nearest chair. "Klaus! Est-il possible? Has he spoken already, then?"

"Not to her, but to me, aunt. He came about five o'clock this afternoon; Anna Maria was sitting at the window as he rode into the court, and she got up at once and went to her room. Stürmer sent in word to me that he wanted to speak to me alone; and then—truly, Aunt Rose, you do know how to observe—then he said to me that he loved Anna Maria, that he thought his affection was reciprocated, and other things that people usually say on such occasions; he spoke of his age, and said that he would be not only a husband but a father as well to Anna Maria. I assured him that I had the deepest respect for him, which is quite true, and after about an hour went to Anna Maria to get her answer. Her door was open; she was sitting at her little sewing table by the window, looking out into the garden; she held her New Testament in her hand, but laid it down as I came near her. I thought she had been crying, and turned her face around to me; but her eyes were dry and burning, and her forehead feverishly hot. As I began to speak she turned her head to the window again and sat motionless as a statue. I must have asked her certainly three times: 'Anna Maria, what shall I answer him? Will you do it yourself? Shall I send him to you?' 'No, no!' she cried at length, 'don't send him! I cannot see him; tell him that I—he must not be angry with me—I do not love him! Klaus, I cannot go away from here! Let me stay with you!' And then she sprang up, threw her arms about my neck, and stuck to me like a bur; but her whole frame trembled, and I thought I could feel her hot hands through my coat. After much persuasion, and promising that I would never force her, I got her so far as to sit down quietly at last; but I had to give the poor fellow his answer—and that was no trifling matter!"

"For God's sake, Klaus, what did Stürmer say?"

"Not one word, aunt; I spared him all I could, but he grew as white as the plaster on the wall. At last he asked: 'Can I speak to Anna Maria?' I said, 'No,' in accordance with her wish; then he took up his hat and whip, and bade me good-by as heartily as usual, to be sure, but the hand he gave me trembled. Poor fellow! I do pity him!"

"And Anna Maria?"

"I cannot find her, aunt, either in the sitting-room or in her own room."

At the farther end of the Hegewitz garden stood an old, very old linden; the spot was somewhat elevated, and a turfy slope stretched down to the budding privet-hedge which bounded the garden. Under the linden was a sandstone bench, also old and weather beaten, and from here one could look away out on the Mark country, far, far out over cornfields and green meadows, dark pine forests and sandy patches of heath.

There stood Anna Maria, looking toward the meadow on the other side of the road, with its countless fresh mole-hills, and the wet road which ran along beside the quiet little river, on whose banks the willows were already growing yellow. How often of late had she stood here, how often waited till a brown horse's head emerged from among the willows, and then turned quickly and hurried into the house, for he must not see that she was watching for him with all the longing of a warm, first love. And to-day? She did not know herself how she had come hither, and she looked blankly away into the mist of the spring evening as if she neither saw the golden rays of the setting sun nor heard the shouting of the village children in the distance. The air was intoxicatingly soft and played gently with the black lace veil which had fallen from Anna Maria's fair hair. She noticed it not. Then she quickly turned her head; the breathing and step of a horse sounded along by the hedge: "Kurt Stürmer!" she whispered, and started to go. But she stopped and saw him come near, saw him ride away in the rosy evening; his eyes were cast downward. How could he know who was looking after him with eyes almost transfixed with burning pain? She stood there motionless, and looked after him; the horse's tread sounded ominously in her ears as he stepped upon the little bridge which united the Dambitz and Hegewitz fields, and she still remained motionless after the willows had hidden the solitary horseman from sight.