nmindful of his promise to maintain his composure, "who is to blame for
it all, save you and your boundless imprudence?"

Eva, with uplifted hands, tried to explain how, unconscious of her acts,
she had walked in her sleep down the stairs and out of the house, but he
imperiously cut her short with:

"Silence! I know all. My daughter gave a worthless tempter the right to
expect the worst from her. You, whom we deemed the ornament of this
house, whose purity hitherto was stainless, are to blame if people
passing on the street point at it! Alas! alas! Our honour, our ancient,
unsullied name!"

Groaning aloud, the father struck his brow with his clenched hand; but
when Els rose and passed her arm around his shoulders to speak words of
consolation, Eva, who hitherto had vainly struggled for words, could
endure no more.

"Whoever says that of me, my father," she exclaimed with flashing eyes;
scarcely able to control her voice, "has opened his ears to slander; and
whoever terms Heinz Schorlin a worthless tempter, is blinded by a
delusion, and I call him to his face, even were it my own father, to whom
I owe gratitude and respect--"

But here she stopped and extended her arms to keep off the deeply angered
man, for he had started forward with quivering lips, and--she perceived
it clearly--was already under the spell of one of the terrible fits of
fury which might lead him to the most unprecedented deeds. Els, however,
had clung to him and, while holding him back with all her strength, cried
out in a tone of keen reproach, "Is this the way you keep your promise?"

Then, lowering her voice, she continued with loving entreaty: "My dear,
dear father, can you doubt that she was asleep, unconscious of her acts,
when she did what has brought so much misery upon us?"

And, interrupting herself, she added eagerly in a tone of the firmest
conviction: "No, no, neither shame nor misery has yet touched you, my
father, nor the poor child yonder. The suspicion of evil rests on me, and
me alone, and if any one here must be wretched it is I."

Then Herr Ernst, regaining his self-control, drew back from Eva, but the
latter, as if fairly frantic, exclaimed: "Do you want to drive me out of
my senses by your mysterious words and accusations? What, in the name of
all the saints, has happened that can plunge my Els into misery and
shame?"

"Into misery and shame," repeated her father in a hollow tone, throwing
himself into a chair, where he