It was May. The trees had shaken off their snowy blossoms, and the huge beds of hyacinths and crocuses, which had been so admired on the lawn before the villa, had quite done blooming. The lilacs and syringas were in flower, the tender green buds were just peeping forth upon the rose-bushes, and the shade in the shrubbery and in the linden avenue was growing deeper and darker. The river ran once more clear through the garland of green that bordered it on either side, and over the dear old house upon its bank there clambered a web of greenery that, day by day, concealed more and more of the white walls. The healthy grape-vines drooped their tendrils even above the overhanging eaves.

The guest-chamber stood untenanted once more. Henriette had been removed some time since to the villa, apparently quite recovered; indeed, her disease seemed to be checked: its progress was not perceptible; and this beneficial change the dean's widow ascribed to Kitty's nursing. The two sisters in their third story led a pleasant, isolated existence that was full of fresh charm since the new piano had been placed in Kitty's room. Not to Kitty's care alone was Henriette's improvement due: her intimate intercourse with the doctor's aunt had proved of great advantage to her. Her views of life and of its duties and pleasures had undergone a change in the quiet of the house by the river. She no longer recoiled from the thought of a retired life,—the whirl of fashion and society aroused in her now no eager longings.

And, in truth, the councillor's home had never been so gay in a worldly sense as at present, since the elevation of its master to the aristocracy. There were many occasions, and very welcome ones, for festivities of various kinds, and the Frau President's invention and the councillor's purse seemed alike inexhaustible. The man's good fortune was wondrous indeed. Disturbed by no loss, no failure, whatever was touched by the enchanted wand of his business genius seemed to turn to gold,—his wealth was estimated by millions. And he thoroughly understood how to wear the glory of his new distinction, how to make it interesting, an inexhaustible theme of wonder and admiration for rich and poor. The road past Villa Baumgarten became a fashionable promenade; strangers were shown the magnificent estate which was always being added to and improved. They told of costly pictures and statuary, of rare collections gathered together within those marble walls of a plate-room not to be equalled in the royal palace. The crowd halted and gaped when one of his equipages waited before the gates, and wondered whether the light cloud of sand, stirred by the wind upon the gravel-walks, were not gold-dust.

Large additions were building, making long stretches of road through the park almost impassable, heaped up as they were with blocks of granite and marble to be used in these additions and in the new stables, the old ones, although spacious and convenient, having long been too small for the councillor's passion for fine horses. The ground selected for the artificial lake proved rather unsuitable for such an adornment, and this, with the new tropical conservatory, absorbed enormous sums of money. And one day a multitude of workmen arrived to undertake the repair of an extensive and very elegant pavilion, which had been hitherto locked up and in disuse. It was situated in the forest, at a considerable distance from the villa, but from its upper windows there was a good view of the road and the town. A graceful wing was added to the original building, the windows were all provided with plate-glass, and from time to time the councillor would produce from his pocket patterns of stuffs for covering furniture, or drawings for parquet floorings, and beg the aid of the Frau President's taste in their selection. On such occasions she was wont to be very curt and ungracious, while Flora smiled behind her pocket-handkerchief; but the old lady was forced to choose, in spite of her declaration that she was not at all interested in the renovation of the old "barracks," and had quite enough of work to last her lifetime in the arrangement and ordering of the villa, without troubling herself about a lodging-house for business friends of the councillor's, a place where she certainly never should set her foot. Therefore she steadily ignored the new building, in spite of the incessant noise and hammering that resounded thence, much as the ambitious spouse of a reigning sovereign ignores her future dower-house.

In all this bustle, this hurry of beginnings and endings, the councillor came and went like a bird of passage. He made many business excursions, but these were shortly all to have an end, he said, and then he should purchase a large estate in the country and become really one of the landed aristocracy. Whenever he had two or three holidays, he spent much time in the third story; he drank coffee there regularly in the afternoon, to the great vexation of the Frau President, who thereby lost her favourite hour in her conservatory; for she was naturally far too attentive to leave "dear Moritz" to the society of a peevish invalid and an unformed school-girl, and almost always made her appearance with him.

This was a great relief to Kitty, who had conceived an unconquerable, shy dislike of her guardian since he had grown so strangely affable and even tender in his demeanour towards herself, and so false, so deceitful in his external politeness towards the Frau President. Involuntarily she adopted, in her intercourse with him, the dignified reserve of a woman, where she had formerly shown the confidence of a child. And this very change seemed to please and encourage him in his new, strange rÔle. He divined her wishes and fulfilled them; he had long since consented that the unused portion of the mill-garden should be sold to the workmen. He placed no obstacles in the way of any of her benevolent schemes, and, when her purse was empty, filled it without a word of remonstrance. "Deny yourself the fulfilment of no whim, Kitty; I shall soon have to buy you another iron safe," he said, in allusion to the astounding increase of her capital. She listened in gloomy silence. With all his finesse and diplomatic replies to her grave inquiries, he had never yet disproved the complaint made by the people, that her wealth had been gained by pitiless usury,—a complaint to which the Frau President never lost an opportunity of alluding. The naÏve childish delight Kitty had formerly taken in being so rich had been converted into a kind of dread of the money which was so swiftly, so strangely accumulating, only, it might be, to fall upon and crush her at some future day in just retribution.

She had grown notably graver. The sunny smile that her lively temperament had so often called up upon her face was now rare. She was never unreservedly gay, except in the house by the river, and there only at certain times. The dean's widow had been for some time charitably teaching a number of poor children to knit and to sew, every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon. In this little scheme Kitty, with the joyful consent of the old lady, had taken part. Intercourse with children was something entirely novel in her experience, stirring chords in her nature the existence of which she had never suspected. She took heartfelt delight in the little creatures, and admitted to herself that the care and instruction of them was an occupation beyond all others to her in interest.

She clothed them when they needed it,—there was always an apron or little dress in her work-basket,—and she provided (which the dean's widow could not have afforded) fruit and biscuit for their refreshment when the hour of industry was over. In the summer the lessons were given in the garden, and when they were over the children, for the most part living in the closest and darkest alleys of the town could enjoy a romp on the grass in the shade of the fruit-trees. Kitty had provided portable benches for seats, and balls and hoops for the hour of recreation that followed work.

Flora was greatly vexed at all this, which she chose to regard as an infringement of her rights with regard to the doctor's aunt, but she was wise enough to suppress all evidence of her annoyance in the house by the river, since "the old woman took it so very ill if the tall girl with vulgar red cheeks and genuine Sommer features was not regarded as a perfect pattern-card of every imaginable virtue." The beautiful betrothed visited the house daily; she had had a dozen embroidered white aprons made, trimmed with lace, and never appeared without this domestic adornment, which became her admirably. No one could accuse her of not making every exertion to gain the approval of the doctor's aunt. She exposed her delicate face to the heat of the kitchen fire that she might learn how to bake cake; she took lessons in pickling and preserving, and once even took the flat-iron from the maid-servant's hand and herself ironed a table-napkin; but, in spite of these tremendous exertions, she never succeeded in inducing the dean's widow to depart in the smallest degree from the courteous but excessively reserved demeanour that she had adopted towards her nephew's betrothed ever since that most unlucky evening. She seemed to know perfectly well how, after these efforts, Flora would withdraw to her dressing-room as if fatigued to death, there to pull off her apron and toss it into a corner, and then usually to refresh herself by a round of visits in the carriage to her friends, whose ill-concealed envy was an inexhaustible source of satisfaction for her. These friends maintained unanimously that the university professor's future wife gave herself the airs of a full-plumaged peacock as she rolled along in her coupÉ, and that her arrogance was almost unbearable.

The sudden change in Doctor Bruck's career was still a nine-days' wonder. Many could hardly yet believe that the calumniated and depreciated young physician of a few weeks since now walked the streets of the capital an actual Hofrath. The man grew daily in the estimation of court and public; and, since his removal to L—— would in future make him unattainable, every sufferer was desirous of benefiting by his skill. Thus it happened that Doctor Bruck was actually overwhelmed with patients. His manuscript lay untouched upon his writing-table; he slept in his lodgings in town, taking his meals there usually, and thus declining to avail himself of the councillor's daily invitations to dine; any time spent at the villa or with his aunt had to be stolen, as he expressed it, from his patients.

Kitty saw him but seldom, and was all the more struck with the great change in him, probably in consequence of hard work, she thought. He looked pale and wearied; his former quiet but gentle reserve had become gloomy taciturnity. With Kitty he had scarcely interchanged two words since she had surprised his tÊte-À-tÊte with Flora in the hall, and his curt manner towards her had been such as to convince her that her inopportune appearance on that occasion had greatly angered him. It wounded her that it should be so, and she avoided him whenever she could.

In his conduct towards Flora, on the other hand, there was not the slightest change; he was the same grave, dignified person whom Kitty had seen the first time she had seen the betrothed pair together. Sometimes she half believed that the terrible scene by Henriette's bedside was either a freak of her own imagination, or else that Doctor Bruck possessed a power, common to no other mortal, of forgetting, of absolutely obliterating from his memory, disagreeable occurrences. Flora had evidently expected that her entreaty for forgiveness, her manifest repentance, would restore the intimate intercourse of the first weeks of their betrothal. Loving her so passionately as he did, must he not be intensely happy in knowing her now irrevocably his own again? Perhaps the happiness was there, only concealed for the present, and his beautiful betrothed might console herself by reflecting that a man of Bruck's stamp was not too easily appeased, that all would be as she would have it by September, the month now fixed for the marriage.

In the meanwhile, the twentieth of May, Flora's birthday, had come. Every table in her room was covered with flowers, the usual gifts of her friends. Even the princess had sent a magnificent bouquet to the betrothed of the Hofrath, whom she delighted to honour, and the most flattering congratulations poured in from various grandees of the court. Yes, it was a day of triumph for Flora; a day to strengthen her in the conviction that she was a favourite of the gods, one destined to an exceptionally brilliant career.

And yet there was a cloud upon her brow, and now and then she frowned darkly upon the table in the centre of the room. Among the gifts from her grandmother and her sisters stood a handsome mantel-clock of black marble. Doctor Bruck had sent it to her early in the morning, with an accompanying congratulatory note, excusing his non-appearance before the afternoon, on the ground of anxiety concerning a patient who was very ill.

"I cannot understand why Leo could find nothing prettier for me than that clumsy thing," she said, as she pointed to the clock, to the Frau President, who had taken the princess's bouquet from a vase and was smelling it eagerly, as if it must exhale a peculiar perfume. "No one likes to give a black birthday present; for my part, I consider it at least very bad taste."

"The clock is very suitable, chosen quite in accordance with your taste, Flora; it is intended to complete the decoration of this room," said Henriette. She was lying on the crimson couch, and, as she spoke, she glanced contemptuously at the black marble pedestals in the corners of the room.

"Nonsense! you know as well as I that I cannot take this furniture away with me. Moritz furnished this room entirely according to my desire, it is true, but so far as I know he has given me neither the furniture nor the hangings. And I would not take them away with me if he offered them to me,—one grows just as tired of a stereotyped style of furnishing as of a dress that has been often worn. What in the world shall I do with that black thing in L——, in my new boudoir that is furnished in lilac with bronze ornaments?"

"I, too, should have preferred a fresh bouquet; but you are not sentimental, Flora," Henriette remarked, not without a shade of malice. Kitty, dressed in white to-day for the first time, was standing beside a beautiful myrtle-bush which the dean's widow had reared herself and sent as her gift. The girl, with a sorrowful smile, passed her hand as if in a caress over its shining tender leaves. No one appreciated this beautiful present, which it must have cost the giver a pang to resign.

In the afternoon, also, the reception-rooms were open, for visitors were still coming with congratulations. The entire suite of these lower rooms, when opened, presented a charming coup-d'oeil. The warm air blew in through the gilt bronze tracery of the balcony, bearing on its wings the odour of the lindens in the avenue and of the opening flowers on the lawn; the golden May sunshine streamed through the high windows. In the crimson room alone it was powerless to awaken a single bright reflection. There all looked dark and cold as ever,—it seemed cruel to imprison all the lovely flowers upon the tables within those four dark walls.

Henriette reclined in a rocking-chair opposite the open door of the balcony. She would have liked to look as like the May as Kitty, and her emaciated figure was enveloped in clouds of white muslin; but she was cold, and had wrapped about her shoulders a soft white shawl of embroidered crape, over which her abundant hair fell in rich waves; it had never been coiled up since her last attack.

Thus lying motionless in the flickering sunlight, with her large dark-blue eyes wide open, shaded by their long dark lashes, and her snowy skin only near the temples tinged with faint carmine, she looked like a waxen doll. She had sent Kitty to the piano in the music-room, and was awaiting, with hands folded in her lap, the beginning of Schubert's "Lob der ThrÄnen." Suddenly the faint flush near her temples deepened to rose, and her clasped hands involuntarily sought her heart—Doctor Bruck entered the drawing-room.

Flora flew towards him and hung upon his arm. She scarce gave him time to speak to the others, but drew him into her room to look at her birthday gifts. The beautiful woman who had endeavoured for so long to impress all with her learning and studious habits of research, to-day, on her twenty-ninth birthday, manifested the naÏve grace of a girl of sixteen, and was indeed, with her lovely animated face and supple lithe movements, charmingly youthful.

Kitty stood by the music-stand, looking for the notes of the song, as the pair passed her on the way to Flora's room. She looked around for an instant, to receive Bruck's half-embarrassed bow, and then went on diligently with her search.

"Look, Leo, to-day I close with the past, wherein I erred so sadly and almost destroyed the happiness of my life," Flora said, in her irresistibly sweet voice, as Kitty took from the shelf a thick portfolio of music. "I would not recall the memory of that wretched evening, when I lost all self-control and, in my excitement and agitation, uttered words in which my heart and soul had no share; but, for the truth's sake, and because I owe it to myself, I must tell you that you too were wrong then in your adverse criticism of me. It was no desire for notoriety that drove me to authorship, but true talent,—to speak plainly, genius. Ask me no further! I can assure you I could have made my way by my work, 'Woman,' which you have never seen. According to the verdict of competent judges, it is indeed calculated to win me name and fame in the world; but how could I desire, by your side, to follow any path of my own, or to exercise any of my special gifts? No, Leo, I will bask solely in the light of your fame, as is fitting for a woman, and, in order that temptation may never in the future again assail me, these pages, the result of diligent study and of the fount of poesy in my soul, must vanish from the world."

Kitty, who had just found the notes she had been seeking, turned at this moment to take her place at the piano. She saw Flora hold a lighted match to her manuscript, and throw it, blazing, into the fire-place. The beautiful woman turned her head towards the window where the doctor was standing; perhaps she wished that he should make an attempt to hinder her from what she was doing; but no step was audible, no hand was extended to snatch the precious fuel from the flames. The smoke of the burning paper, borne on the wind of spring, floated into the music-room; and as Flora, biting her under lip, and with a strange gleam in her eyes, stepped back from the fire-place, Kitty took her seat at the piano and began Liszt's arrangement of the "Lob der ThrÄnen."

Kitty would not listen to Bruck's reply; it was terrible to her to be perpetually an involuntary witness of these scenes between the betrothed pair; it would end in Bruck's hating her. But she was indignant at the farce she had again seen played. The battered manuscript, repeatedly pronounced to be worthless by competent critics, had been dragged out once more, to play the part of a tragic sacrifice made by a high-minded woman, who thus in submission to a stern lord and master renounced the genius which she was aware she possessed.

Through the melody that Kitty's fingers evoked from the piano the girl could hear a continuous murmur of sound, in which she distinguished the grave tone of the doctor's voice, although, to her great satisfaction, no distinct word was audible. As she concluded, Flora entered the room to pass through to the balconied apartment. She no longer hung upon Bruck's arm, but walked beside him with the princess's bouquet in her hand, looking like a child who has been reproved and dares not reply. Flora had found her master. She darted an angry glance towards her sister, whose hands were just lifted from the keys of the piano at the close of the piece. "Thank heaven, you have done, Kitty!" she said, standing still. "You bang away so that I can scarcely hear my own voice. You see, you play your own little things very fairly,—they are nursery airs, without any depth; but really you ought not to attempt Schubert or Liszt; you have neither sufficient taste nor execution."

"Henriette asked for that piece," Kitty calmly replied, as she closed the instrument. "I do not pretend to be a skilled musician——"

"No, my darling, indeed you do not; you do not care to make people stare at your wonderful dexterity," suddenly interrupted Henriette, appearing upon the threshold of the door as she spoke; "but never was there girl who could interpret Schubert as you can. Or does Flora think that the tears you bring to our eyes start entirely out of conventional politeness?"

"They come from morbid nerves, nothing more!" replied Flora, laughing, as she followed the doctor into the drawing-room, whither the Frau President had called him.

The old lady was looking somewhat perplexed, as she sat with her eye-glass in one hand, and in the other a letter, which the servant had just brought her. "Ah, my dearest Hofrath,"—she used this title as often as she possibly could, for the sound of it flattered her ear,—"my friend Baroness Steiner writes me that she is coming here in a few days to consult you. She is very anxious about her little grandson, the hope of the ancient family Von Brandau. The boy has limped a little for some time, and our most skilful physicians have searched in vain for the cause of the trouble. Will you examine the child, and take him in charge?"

"Certainly; provided the lady does not make too great a demand upon my time." He well knew how fond the high-born dame in question was of being waited for, and that she chose to have a cold in any one of her family respected as if it were a mortal illness.

The Frau President was evidently offended at the indifference with which her request was treated; she made no reply.

"The Baroness seems piqued by my recent postponement of her visit," she said, addressing Flora; "this letter," tapping it with her eye-glass, "is full of satire; if she had not been worried and anxious, she never would have written to me. I can hardly tell you how it pains me. Now she wishes to take rooms in the best hotel that can be found, where our Hofrath can visit her, and begs me at least to do her the favour to secure a suite of five apartments for her." And as she spoke she cast an annihilating glance from beneath her drooping eyelids towards the lovely girl in the white dress, who, standing opposite her, behind a large arm-chair, rested her arms upon the back of it, and grew alternately red and pale as she listened to what was, every word of it, intended as a reproach for her.

"She might be very comfortable on the third floor, if she did not really need five rooms," the Frau President continued. "But she must have a drawing-room for herself and her daughter Marie, a school-room for little Job von Brandau and his governess, and three sleeping-rooms at the very least. Of course she brings her maid." Much out of humour, she leaned her head on her hand, in anxious reverie.

"All of which means that, during the visit of this pretentious Baroness, Kitty will be in the way," Henriette angrily exclaimed.

"I have offered to go to the mill," Kitty said, without a trace of irritation, as she passed her hand soothingly over Henriette's hair.

"Oh, no; I have thought of a far better plan, Kitty, if you must go," the invalid cried, with sparkling eyes. "We will beg the dean's widow to give you her lovely spare room; I know she will be delighted, for she fairly dotes upon you. Your piano can be taken over there, and I can go to you whenever I choose——" She stopped as her eyes met those of the doctor. He had turned away at first towards the window, but he looked around now with undeniable disapproval on his face,—he scarcely seemed like himself.

"I propose what seems to me far more fitting and practicable, that the boy and his governess shall be lodged in my house," he said, coldly.

The Frau President loosened the cloud of lace beneath her chin, and could not suppress a fleeting, ironical smile. "That can scarcely be arranged, my dear Hofrath," she replied. "Nothing could induce my old friend to be separated from Job, and then—you have no idea what a spoiled child he is. Our own little prince is not so delicately brought up as this last and only scion of the Brandaus; the poor, puny little creature is bedded in satin and down. Yes, those people think such luxuries only en rÈgle. But we are put to it to make them comfortable."

"And why, Leo, should you prefer to give your aunt the trouble of having that little monster—the petted scion of the Von Brandaus is positively the naughtiest and most good-for-nothing little wretch in the world—in her house?" Henriette indignantly asked; her nerves were in just the irritated state that prompted her to say what she might hereafter regret. "What has Kitty done to you? It has pained me for some time to see how unjust you are to her. Do you despise her because her grandfather was the castle miller? You hardly ever speak to her; and it is ridiculous, for at all events she is Flora's sister. She is the only one of us who never addresses you by your Christian name."

"My dear," Flora interrupted her, "I have long objected to that familiar address, and if my wishes were consulted, no one would use it. To tell the truth, I grudge an iota of my right to any one else. With regard to yourself, Henriette, I let it pass; but I really entreat that Kitty may not allow herself such a liberty." And she put her hand within the doctor's arm and looked tenderly up in his face.

Embarrassed, perhaps, by this public display of affection, or irritated by Henriette's reproof, the doctor started as if the white hand had been an odious reptile, and his colour changed.

Kitty turned to leave the room. She could have burst into tears of wounded feeling, but she bravely endured her pain and maintained a calm demeanour. Just as she reached the door, it opened, and the councillor entered. She forgot for the moment the dislike she had felt for him of late, remembering only that he was her guardian and stood in a father's place with regard to her, and as a result of this she lightly laid her hand on his arm in greeting.

He looked surprised, but with a satisfied smile and an arch twinkle in his eyes he pressed the little hand to his heart. His own hands were not free: they held a small chest, which he placed upon the table by which the Frau President was sitting. His entrance interrupted a most painful scene, and Henriette, who had been the cause of it, could have fallen upon his neck in gratitude to him for the easy, happy tone which he adopted in his unconsciousness.

"Now I am content; my birthday gift for you, Flora, has come at last," he said. "My Berlin agent accuses the manufacturers of the delay in its arrival." He lifted the cover. "Apropos, I have another birthday pleasure for you," he added, with a gay, jesting air. "I have just heard that you are avenged,—the leader of the attack upon you in the forest, she of the menacing nails, has been sentenced to-day to a considerable term of imprisonment; the others, who were either very young or misled by her, have escaped with a reprimand."

"I cannot think that your news will really give Flora any pleasure," cried Henriette; "of course such offences must not go unpunished, and it can do that fierce MegÆra no harm to be shut up alone for a while; but there was something so terrible for us all in that whole adventure, it is so dreadful to be so hated, that I wish you had said nothing about it, Moritz."

"Do you think so?" Flora asked, with a laugh. "Moritz knows me better; he knows I am quite above being moved by it, and would not stir a finger for the sake of popularity. And you were the same a while ago, Henriette. I should like to know what you would have said eight months ago if any one in our circle had advocated the rights of the people; all that was entirely beneath your notice. But since Kitty has been here, such questions and discussions are the order of the day on the third floor, to such a degree that one stands abashed in presence of such Spartan virtue and feminine heroism. I should not wonder if Kitty had already been searching her cook-book for recipes for nourishing soups to keep the culprit strong in her confinement."

"No, not that," Kitty bravely replied, looking full into the beautiful and impertinent face turned towards her; "but I have made inquiries about her family. She has four little children, and her unmarried brother, who was one of Moritz's workmen and helped to provide for the fatherless little ones, has been lying ill for a long time. Of course these five helpless creatures must not suffer; and I have undertaken to provide for them as long as they are thus destitute."

The councillor turned round, and a remonstrance seemed hovering upon his lips. "Yes, Moritz," the young girl said, hastily, "at such moments I have less horror of my grandfather's hoards."

The Frau President pushed back her chair impatiently. This "maudlin sentimentality" was beyond a jest. "These are most extraordinary statements and strangely perverted views of life and the world! Wealth could not possibly fall into more dangerous hands," she cried. "Yes, my dear Hofrath, I see you look in wonder at the hand now laid so beseechingly on Moritz's arm because he would fain restrain it from such wilful expenditure."

Kitty instantly withdrew her hand. She saw the doctor gloomily avert his gaze, but he made no reply to the Frau President's remark.

"Ah, grandmamma, that was surely no glance of disapproval," Flora cried, as she watched suspiciously the changing colour on the doctor's cheek. "Bruck always was a kind of enthusiast for the lower classes——"

"He surely is so no longer, my child,—now that he frequents the court and enjoys the prince's most distinguished regard."

"And why should such intercourse undermine my principles?" the doctor asked, with apparent composure, although his voice sounded uncertain, as if he were undergoing a mental struggle.

"Good heavens! you would not ally yourself with the revolutionary party—with those social democrats?" the Frau President cried, in dismay.

"I think I have already explained several times that, for very humanity's sake, I belong to none of these extreme parties. I endeavour to preserve that clear judgment which party hate is sure to cloud, and which is most desirable if one wishes to labour for the true weal of his fellow-mortals."

Meanwhile, the councillor had been busy unpacking the chest. He especially disliked to have any topic touched upon the discussion of which might endanger the peace of his household. He now unfolded a piece of rich maize-coloured satin and another of violet velvet. "A couple of toilettes for your first dÉbut as the wife of a distinguished professor," he said to Flora.

His end was gained. The splendour of the stuffs was too attractive for female eyes; even Henriette forgot her irritation at sight of a couple of exquisite fans, and some boxes of artificial flowers from Paris. But the contents of the chest were not yet exhausted. "The other ladies of my household must not go empty-handed, especially since I am to be at home now for some time and shall have no other opportunity of bringing them gifts," the councillor continued.

The Frau President, with a gracious smile, accepted a costly lace shawl, and Henriette a white silk dress, while into Kitty's reluctant hand the councillor, with a peculiarly significant glance, put a tolerably large morocco case.

This glance aroused in an instant in the girl's soul a perfect tempest of emotion, calling into life all the aversion that had of late stirred within her towards her guardian and brother-in-law. No, no, a thousand times no,—he should not gaze at her thus, as if together they shared a secret which none else might know; once for all, she would put a stop to this. Shame, annoyance, and an almost irresistible desire openly to proclaim her aversion now before every one, filled her soul and were mirrored on her face, although its changing expression was misunderstood.

"Well, Kitty, is it such a novelty for you to receive a present?" asked Flora. "What has Moritz given you? We must be told the sweet secret some time. Let me see it, child." She took the case as it was nearly dropping upon the floor, and pressed the spring that opened the lid. A crimson light flashed from the stones forming the necklace that lay inside upon black velvet.

The Frau President put up her eye-glass. "Superbly set; almost too artistically antique for imitation, although modern fashion certainly sanctions its being worn. This paste is uncommonly clear and sparkling." She negligently extended her hand for the case, that she might more conveniently examine its contents.

"Paste?" the councillor repeated, much piqued. "How, grandmamma, can you accuse me of such want of taste? Is there a thread here that is not genuine?" He passed his hand over the pile of glistening silks. "You ought to know that I never purchase imitations."

The Frau President bit her lip. "I do know it, Moritz; but really in this case I am astounded,—these are such rubies as even our beloved princess does not possess."

"Then I am sorry that the prince cannot afford to give them to her," the councillor rejoined, with a conceited smile. "I certainly should be ashamed to present Kitty with a valueless gift,—Kitty, who in a couple of years will be her own mistress and will be able to buy as many jewels as she pleases. Any imitation would then be tossed contemptuously aside."

"I agree with you there," the Frau President remarked, ironically. "Kitty has a decided preference for the solid and expensive,—witness the heavy silks which she always wears. But, my child," and she turned to the young girl, who had folded her trembling hands again on the back of the chair by which she stood, and made no motion to possess herself of the jewels, "a knowledge of how to dress one's self must be the result of taste, acquired by intercourse with people of refinement. Such gorgeous stones are not befitting your eighteen years; a plain cross or locket is more becoming so youthful a neck. The most you should wear would be a simple coral or pearl necklace."

"But Kitty will not always be eighteen or always a girl, grandmamma," Flora exclaimed. "We know that well enough,—eh, Kitty?"

The young girl's eyes flashed indignantly at the air and tone of the speaker. She turned proudly away to depart without a word.

"Only see how dignified the child can look!" Flora said, with a forced laugh. She could not succeed in quite concealing her vexation. "She behaves as if my harmless trifling had betrayed a state secret. Is it a crime, then, to want to be married? Nonsense, you little prude! Never deny in public what may be confessed in confidential moments." She ran her fingers over the sparkling rubies with a mischievous and significant glance at the councillor. "Yes, Moritz, this certainly is a necklace fit only for—the wife of a millionaire."

The Frau President now arose, hastily gathered up her letters and her eye-glass, and drew her scarf over her shoulders to leave the room. "I hope you will never falter in your love of the genuine, my dear Moritz," she said, coldly. "The champagne in which we drank Flora's health to-day was wanting in that quality: it has given me a headache. I must lie down for a while."

At the door she turned once more. "When I have refreshed myself a little, I must beg you to come to some conclusion," she said, holding out a letter to the councillor. "Read that, and you will see that the Baroness must not be put off and offended a second time. I yielded the other day for the sake of peace, but indeed I cannot submit so entirely again. People of position really cannot be pulled about like puppets and shaken off at pleasure. Remember that, I beg you, Moritz."

She left the room with a stately inclination and an air of severe dignity.