ut as Felix had been the last to arrive, he easily found his hat and
cloak in the dressing-room without Fridolin's assistance. He carefully
wrapped a large woolen shawl, which he recognized as belonging to
Angelica, about the head and shoulders of his sweetheart, and then
threw his own cloak over the whole, so that she would have been well
protected even for a colder night.

"But don't cover up your face entirely; I must have a chance to find
your lips!" he whispered, and immediately kissed her as if to put her
to the test. But she held him tight, and with a passionate submission,
of which he had hardly believed her capable, returned his kiss and held
up her glowing face to his, submitting to his stormy caresses in happy
confusion, and returning them anew.

Not until she was startled by a noise did she ask him in a pleading
voice to desist. Then he put his arm about her and went out with her
into the mild winter's night, covered peacefully in its snowy mantle.
No star looked down from heaven, but it seemed to these two happy
beings, wandering all alone among the trees, as if the world about them
were in flames, and they were walking through it unscathed, for in
their hearts there raged a hotter fire.

CHAPTER VI.

In the mean time the ball went on, notwithstanding the absence of this
happy couple, and no one seemed to miss anything. But the later it grew
the more impatiently did the eyes of the red-bearded Capuchin wander
toward the door through which he was expecting the angel of Paradise to
enter and announce that a guest in a cowl was standing outside the door
and waiting for admission. He racked his brains in the vain effort to
imagine what could possibly have detained his lady, who, only a short
time before, had expressed such a strong desire to be present at the
masquerade; and when it struck eleven, and nothing had appeared, he
secretly gave up the affair as lost. As he had made up his mind that
the mysterious stranger would in the end reveal herself in all her
beauty, and afford him an opportunity to celebrate a great triumph, he
naturally felt very much put out at finding that he had been playing a
fool's part, and he slunk about as embarrassed and wretched as a wet
sparrow.

But his distress proved useless, after all. The intermission that
preceded the cotillon had begun, and every one had streamed into the
supper-room to eat and drink, when Fridolin, entering the hal