he
came out, but when he did he waved her back, and hurried on; she had a
glimpse of his face, white to the lips. Feeling faint and sick, she flew
to her stepfather's room.

Herr Paul was standing in a corner with the utterly disturbed appearance
of an easy-going man, visited by the unexpected. His fine shirt-front
was crumpled as if his breast had heaved too suddenly under strong
emotion; his smoked eyeglasses dangled down his back; his fingers were
embedded in his beard. He was fixing his eye on a spot in the floor as
though he expected it to explode and blow them to fragments. In another
corner Mrs. Decie, with half-closed eyes, was running her finger-tips
across her brow.

"What have you said to him?" cried Christian.

Herr Paul regarded her with glassy eyes.

"Mein Gott!" he said. "Your aunt and I!"

"What have you said to him?" repeated Christian.

"The impudence! An anarchist! A beggar!"

"Paul!" murmured Mrs. Decie.

"The outlaw! The fellow!" Herr Paul began to stride about the room.

Quivering from head to foot, Christian cried: "How dared you?" and ran
from the room, pushing aside Miss Naylor and Greta, who stood blanched
and frightened in the doorway.

Herr Paul stopped in his tramp, and, still with his eyes fixed on the
floor, growled:

"A fine thing-hein? What's coming? Will you please tell me? An
anarchist--a beggar!"

"Paul!" murmured Mrs. Decie.

"Paul! Paul! And you!" he pointed to Miss Naylor--"Two women with
eyes!--hein!"

"There is nothing to be gained by violence," Mrs. Decie murmured,
passing her handkerchief across her lips. Miss Naylor, whose thin brown
cheeks had flushed, advanced towards him.

"I hope you do not--" she said; "I am sure there was nothing that I
could have prevented--I should be glad if that were understood." And,
turning with some dignity, the little lady went away, closing the door
behind her.

"You hear!" Herr Paul said, violently sarcastic: "nothing she could have
prevented! Enfin! Will you please tell me what I am to do?"

"Men of the world"--whose philosophy is a creature of circumstance and
accepted things--find any deviation from the path of their convictions
dangerous, shocking, and an intolerable bore. Herr Paul had spent
his life laughing at convictions; the matter had but to touch him
personally, and the tap of laughter was turned off. That any one to whom
he was the lawful guardian should marry other than a well-groomed man,
properly endowed w