r that he
might feast his eyes on a full view of her.

So they came to an open space overgrown with heather where the view
extended far over the country-side. Reinhard bent down and plucked a
bloom from one of the little plants that grew at his feet. When he
looked up again there was an expression of deep pain on his face.

"Do you know this flower?" he asked.

She gave him a questioning look. "It is an erica. I have often
gathered them in the woods."

"I have an old book at home," he said; "I once used to write in it all
sorts of songs and rhymes, but that is all over and done with long
since. Between its leaves also there is an erica, but it is only a
faded one. Do you know who gave it me?"

She nodded without saying a word; but she cast down her eyes and fixed
them on the bloom which he held in his hand. For a long time they
stood thus. When she raised her eyes on him again he saw that they
were brimming over with tears.

"Elisabeth," he said, "behind yonder blue hills lies our youth. What
has become of it?"

Nothing more was spoken. They walked dumbly by each other's side down
to the lake. The air was sultry; to westward dark clouds were rising.
"There's going to be a storm," said Elisabeth, hastening her steps.
Reinhard nodded in silence, and together they rapidly sped along the
shore till they reached their boat.

On the way across Elisabeth rested her hand on the gunwale of the
boat. As he rowed Reinhard glanced along at her, but she gazed past
him into the distance. And so his glance fell downward and rested on
her hand, and the white hand betrayed to him what her lips had failed
to reveal.

It revealed those fine traces of secret pain that so readily mark a
woman's fair hands, when they lie at nights folded across an aching
heart. And as Elisabeth felt his glance resting on her hand she let it
slip gently over the gunwale into the water.

On arriving at the farm they fell in with a scissors grinder's cart
standing in front of the manor-house. A man with black, loosely-flowing
hair was busily plying his wheel and humming a gipsy melody between his
teeth, while a dog that was harnessed to the cart lay panting hard by.
On the threshold stood a girl dressed in rags, with features of faded
beauty, and with outstretched hand she asked alms of Elisabeth.

Reinhard thrust his hand into his pocket, but Elisabeth was before
him, and hastily emptied the entire contents of her purse into the
beggar's open pa