l myself?'

"The spring sun came shining brightly into his room; he pulled himself
together, and resolved to get to the bottom of the mystery in
Berklinger's house, cost what it might. He went there as quickly as he
could; but what were his feelings when he saw that all the windows were
open, and women busy cleaning out the rooms. He felt what had happened.
Berklinger and his son had left the house late the previous evening,
and gone away, no one knew whither. A cart with two horses had taken
away the boxes with the pictures, and the two small trunks which
contained the Berklingers' little all; and he had followed, with his
son, about half-an-hour afterwards. All efforts to trace them were
vain; no stable-keeper had hired out horses to anybody answering to the
description of them which Traugott gave; even at the town-gates he
could hear nothing satisfactory. Berklinger had disappeared as if he
had been carried away on Mephistopheles's mantle. Traugott ran home in
utter despair.

"'She is gone! she is gone! the beloved of my soul! All--all is lost!'
he cried, as he went banging past Elias Roos (who happened to be in the
front hall near the entry door) on his way to his room.

"'God bless my soul and body!' cried Herr Elias, shoving back his wig.
'Christina! Christina!' he then cried till the house rang; 'Christina!
horrible girl! undutiful daughter!'

"The clerks came running out of the office with faces of terror.

"'What's the matter, Herr Roos?' cried the bookkeeper, in great alarm;
but Herr Roos went on shouting 'Christina! Christina!'

"'Just then Christina came in at the street-door, and, after she had
lifted the brim of her broad straw-hat up a little, asked, with a
smile, what her father was making such a shouting about.

"I'm not going to have you bolting away in this inexplicable sort of
way,' Herr Elias roared at her, wrathfully in the extreme. 'The
son-in-law's a melancholy sort of customer, and as jealous as the Grand
Turk. Just you keep at home, d'ye see, or we shall have all the fat in
the fire directly. My partner's sitting in there, howling and groaning,
because you're out of the way somewhere.'

"Christina cast a look of amazement at the bookkeeper, who replied by a
significant glance towards the office-cupboard where Herr Elias kept
the cinnamon-water.

"'Better go in and comfort the intended,' he said, going back to the
office. Christina went to her own room, just to put on some other
'thin