in. If I have
not lost myself, Sabine, I owe it to you."

And again he bent over her hand. Sabine held him fast and whispered, "My
friend! my dear friend! we must both feel that we have dreamed and
struggled--that we have resolved and overcome. What must you not have
suffered, my friend!"

"No," cried Anton, "it was not the same suffering nor the same strength.
I saw and reverenced you at the time when you were silently conquering
yourself. I was a weak, willful man. I do not know what would have
become of me had not your memory lived in my soul. When far away, the
influence you exerted over me went on increasing, and only because I
thought of you became I free."

"And how do you know that it may not have been the same in my case?"
asked Sabine, looking lovingly at him.

"Sabine!" cried Anton, beside himself.

"Yes, that is your own noble face," cried she. "Alas! in your features,
too, I can read the traces of an iron time." She rose. "We have heard of
your heroic deeds, though you sent us nothing during the whole long year
but a short message."

"Could I venture to do more?" broke in Anton, eagerly.

Sabine nodded archly. "We have, however, watched for tidings that
reached us through your friends. Oh! when I, in the midst of these safe
walls, thought of my friend exposed to every assault of the enemy!
Wohlfart! Wohlfart! I rejoice that I see you again."

"Another has the property now, and the care of the defenseless family,"
replied Anton.

"It is the ordering of Providence," cried Sabine; and looked with
delight on the newly-returned one.

In the uniform tenor of her domestic life, she had for many years had a
cordial liking for Anton. Since he had left her, she had found out that
she loved him, and had hidden the feeling in her heart. No trace of her
love nor her renunciation had appeared in the regular household. Hardly
had she by a look betrayed the struggle going on within. Now, in the
rapture of meeting, her feelings broke out. She looked at Anton in
beaming delight, thinking of nothing but the joy of having him with her
again, and not remarking the traces of a different feeling in Anton's
pale features. He has found her indeed, but only to lose her again
forever.

Still does Sabine hold his hand, and now she leads him through the
corridor to her brother's study.

What are you doing, Sabine? This house is a good house, certainly, but
not one in which people feel poetically, are easily moved, open