quite unknown
to you?" I was silent. "A man of superior character and singular
attainments--" He paused for an answer.

"And suppose I were the same man?"

"Who," added he vehemently--"has, by some means, lost his shadow!"

"Oh, my foreboding, my foreboding!" exclaimed Mina. "Yes, I have long
known it, he has no shadow;" and she flung herself into the arms of
her mother, who, terrified, clasped her convulsively, and upbraided
her that to her own hurt she had kept to herself such a secret. But
she, like Arethusa, was changed into a fountain of tears, which at the
sound of my voice flowed still more copiously and at my approach burst
forth in torrents.

"And you," again grimly began the Forest-master, "and you, with
unparalleled impudence, have made no scruple to deceive these and
myself, and you give out that you love her whom you brought into this
predicament. See, there, how she weeps and writhes! Oh, horrible!
horrible!"

I had to such a degree lost my composure that, talking like one
crazed, I began--"And, after all, a shadow is nothing but a shadow;
one can do very well without that, and it is not worth while to make
such a riot about it." But I felt so sharply the baselessness of what
I was saying that I stopped of myself, without his deigning me an
answer, and I then added--"What one has lost at one time may be found
again at another!"

He fiercely rebuked me "Confess to me, sir, confess to me, how became
you deprived of your shadow!"

I was compelled again to lie. "A rude fellow one day trod so heavily
on my shadow that he rent a great hole in it. I have only sent it to
be mended, for money can do much, and I was to have received it back
yesterday."

"Good, sir, very good!" replied the Forest-master. "You solicit my
daughter's hand; others do the same. I have, as her father, to care
for her. I give you three days in which you may seek for a shadow. If
you appear before me within these three days with a good, well-fitting
shadow, you shall be welcome to me; but on the fourth day--I tell you
plainly--my daughter is the wife of another."

I would yet attempt to speak a word to Mina, but she clung, sobbing
violently, only closer to her mother's breast, who silently motioned
me to withdraw. I reeled away, and the world seemed to close itself
behind me.

Escaped from Bendel's affectionate oversight, I traversed in erring
course woods and fields. The perspiration of my agony dropped from my
brow, a hollo