here she lived the more vividly she felt that she did not belong
there, but in the part of Brussels whence she came.

Her own home was far more richly and prettily furnished than her old one
in Red Cock Street, but it did not yet satisfy her desires, and she did
not feel content in it. To-day a slight feeling of aversion even came
over her as she thought of it.

Perhaps the best plan would have been for her to put an end to this
misery, and, instead of returning, make a pilgrimage to Compostella in
Spain, and while doing so try to find her John in Leganes. But even while
yielding to these thoughts Barbara felt how sinful they were. Did not her
little house look attractive and pretty? It was certainly the prettiest
and neatest in the neighbourhood, and as she drew nearer pleasure at the
thought of seeing her children again awoke. An unkind reception from her
husband would have been painful, after all.

But she was to receive no greeting at all from him. Pyramus had been
detained on the way. Barbara felt this as a friendly dispensation of
Providence. But something else spoiled her return home. Conrad, her
oldest boy, two-year-old Conrad, who was already walking about, beginning
to prattle prettily, and who could show the affection of his little heart
with such coaxing tenderness, came toward her crying, and when she took
him up rested his little burning head against her cheek.

The little fellow's forehead and throat were aching.

Some illness was coming on.

The child himself asked to be put in his little bed, the physician was
summoned, and the next morning the scarlet fever broke out.

When the father returned, the youngest chill had also been attacked by
the same fell disease, and now a time came when Barbara, during many an
anxious hour of the night, forgot that in distant Spain she possessed
another child for whose sake she had been ready to rob these two dear
little creatures, who so greatly needed her, of their mother. This
purpose weighed upon her conscience like the heaviest of sins while she
was fighting against Death, which seemed to be already stretching his
hand toward the oldest boy.

When one evening the physician expressed the fear that the child would
not survive the approaching night, she prayed with passionate fervour for
his preservation, and meanwhile it seemed as though a secret voice cried:
"Vow to the gracious Virgin not to give the Emperor's son a higher place
in your heart than the child