ce, as if the connection between my reasoning and my will and
its consequent action had been severed. With a perfectly clear
understanding that it would be better to throw myself from the rocks,
I yet went back to the villa for my revolver. Why? I cannot explain
it. I only remember that I ran faster and faster, at last went up
the stairs into my room, and began to search for the key of my
portmanteau, where the revolver was. Presently I heard steps
approaching my door. This roused me, and the thought flashed through
my mind that it was Aniela, that she had guessed my intention, and
came to prevent it. The door was flung open, and there was my aunt,
who called out in a breathless voice:--

"Leon, go quick for the doctor! Aniela has been taken ill."

Hearing that, I forgot all else, and without hat I rushed forth, and
in a quarter of an hour brought a doctor from the Straubinger hotel.
The doctor went to see Aniela, and I remained with my aunt on the
veranda. I asked her what had happened to Aniela.

"Half an hour ago," said my aunt, "Aniela came back with such a
feverishly burning face that both Celina and I asked whether anything
had happened to her. She replied, 'Nothing, nothing,' almost
impatiently; and when Celina insisted upon knowing what was the matter
with her, Aniela, for the first time since I have known her, lost her
temper and cried out, 'Why are you all bent upon tormenting me?' Then
she became quite hysterical, and laughed and cried. We were terribly
frightened, and then I came and asked you to fetch the doctor. Thank
God, she is calmer now. How she wept, poor child, and asked us to
forgive her for having spoken unkindly to us."

I remained silent; my heart was too full for words.

My aunt paced up and down the veranda, and presently, her arms akimbo,
stopped before me and said,--

"Do you know, my boy, what I am thinking? It is this: We somehow do
not like Kromitzki,--even Celina is not fond of him; and Aniela sees
it, and it hurts her feelings. It is a strange thing; he does his best
to make himself pleasant, and yet he always seems like an outsider. It
is not right, and it grieves Aniela."

"Do you think, aunty, that she loves him so very much?"

"I did not say very much. He is her husband, and so she loves him, and
feels hurt that we treat him badly."

"But who treats him badly? I think she is not happy with him,--that is
all."

"God forbid that you should be right. I do not say but she mig