-

MR. X.--And now you are "thou-ing" me! It alarms me that, after serving
your time, you do not feel your honor retrieved, that you do not feel on
equal footing,--in fact, just as good as any one. Will you tell me how
it happened? Will you?

MR. Y. [Dubiously]. Yes, but you won't believe what I say. I'm going to
tell you, though, and you shall see that I was not a common criminal.
You shall be convinced that mis-steps are made, as one might say,
involuntarily--[Shakily] as if they came of their own accord,
spontaneously, without intention, blamelessly!--Let me open the window a
little. I think the thunder shower-has passed over.

MR. X. Go ahead.

MR. Y. [Goes and opens the window, then comes and sits by the table
again and tells the following with great enthusiasm, theatrical gestures
and false accents]. Well, you see I was a student at Lund, and once
I needed a loan. I had no dangerously big debts, my father had some
means--not very much, to be sure; however, I had sent away a note of
hand to a man whom I wanted to have sign it as second security, and
contrary to all expectations, it was returned to me with a refusal.
I sat for a while benumbed by the blow, because it was a disagreeable
surprise, very disagreeable. The note lay before me on the table, and
beside it the letter of refusal. My eyes glanced hopelessly over
the fatal lines which contained my sentence. To be sure it wasn't a
death-sentence, as I could easily have got some other man to stand as
security; as many as I wanted, for that matter--but, as I've said,
it was very unpleasant; and as I sat there in my innocence, my glance
rested gradually on the signature, which, had it been in the right
place, would have made my future. That signature was most unusual
calligraphy--you know how, as one sits thinking, one can scribble a
whole blotter full of meaningless words. I had the pen in my hand--[He
takes up the pen] like this, and before I knew what I was doing it
started to write,--of course I don't want to imply that there was
anything mystical spiritualistic, behind it--because I don't believe in
such things!--it was purely a thoughtless, mechanical action--when I sat
and copied the beautiful autograph time after time--without, of course,
any prospect of gain. When the letter was scribbled all over, I had
acquired skill enough to reproduce the signature remarkably well [Throws
the pen down with violence] and then I forgot the whole thing. That
night my