certainties; they clung about my mind like cobwebs, and I could not
get rid of their soft, stifling influence.

Having arrived at my lodgings, I mounted the stairs. Frau Lutzler met
me.

"_Na_, _na_, Fraeulein! You do not patronize me much now. My rooms are
becoming too small for you, I reckon."

"Indeed, Frau Lutzler, I wish I had never been in any larger ones," I
answered her, earnestly.

"So! Well, 'tis true you look thin and worn--not as well as you used to.
And were you--but I heard you were, so where's the use of telling lies
about it--at the Maskenball last night? And how did you like it?"

"Oh, it was all very new to me. I never was at one before."

"_Nicht?_ Then you must have been astonished. They say there was a
Mephisto so good he would have deceived the devil himself. And you,
Fraeulein--I heard that you looked very beautiful."

"So! It must have been a mistake."

"_Doch nicht!_ I have always maintained that at certain times you were
far from bad-looking, and dressed and got up for the stage, would be
absolutely handsome. Nearly any one can be that--if you are not too
near the foot-lights, that is, and don't go behind the scenes."

With which neat slaying of a particular compliment by a general one, she
released me, and let me go on my way upstairs.

Here I had some books and some music. But the room was cold; the books
failed to interest me, and the music did not go--the piano was like
me--out of tune. And yet I felt the need of some musical expression
of the mood that was upon me. I bethought myself of the Tonhalle,
next door, almost, and that in the rittersaal it would be quiet and
undisturbed, as the ball that night was not to be held there, but in
one of the large rooms of the Caserne.

Without pausing to think a second time of the plan, I left the house and
went to the Tonhalle, only a few steps away. In consequence of the rain
and bad weather almost every trace of the carnival had disappeared. I
found the Tonhalle deserted save by a bar-maid at the restauration. I
asked her if the rittersaal were open, and she said yes. I passed on. As
I drew near the door I heard music; the piano was already being played.
Could it be von Francius who was there? I did not think so. The touch
was not his--neither so practiced, so brilliant, nor so sure.

Satisfied, after listening a moment, that it was not he, I resolved to
go in and pass through the room. If it were any one whom I could send
away I woul