got up, reached him her hand, smiled with tears in her
eyes, and said with a last attempt to escape the horrible consequences,
"Bruederlein[1]...." She spoke the word in a tone of longing fervour and
half-humorous appealing.

[Footnote 1: "Little brother."]

He shook his head sadly, but took her hand and held it tenderly between
his.

Her face became clouded; it was like a landscape at the coming of night.
Her eyes, turned to one side, saw the trees of a great garden, an ugly
old woman sitting by a hedge, and two little girls who looked into the
setting sun with fear in their hearts.

There was a noise; she and Daniel were startled. In the doorway stood
Philippina Schimmelweis. Her eyes glistened like the skin of a reptile
that has just crept up from out of the bog.

Daniel went down to his apartment.

X

For nine years the rococo hall in the Auffenberg home had been closed to
festive celebrations of every kind. It took a long, tedious exchange of
letters between the secretary of the Baron living in Rome and the
secretary of the Baroness to get the permission of the former to use the
hall.

The indignation at Nothafft's work was general. The members of the
social set could hardly contain themselves, while the amateurs and
specially invited guests were likewise but little edified. The chief
diversion of the evening, in fact, was to see the composer himself
conduct. At the sight of the jumping and sprawling fellow, Herr Zoellner,
councillor of the consistory, almost burst with laughter.

Old Count Schlemm-Nottheim, who not only had a liking for pornographic
literature but was also known to drink a quarter of a litre of Dr.
Rosa's balsam of life every afternoon, declared that the ensemble
playing of all the instruments represented by the show-booths at the
annual fair was an actual musical revelation in comparison with this
Dutch concert of rogues' marches. Judge Braun of the Supreme Court gave
it as his candid opinion that there was evidently a conspiracy against
good taste.

Remarks of this kind were, of course, made behind screens and in the
corners. In order not to offend the Baroness, there was a goodly measure
of seemingly cordial applause. The guests and artists then assembled
around a huge table arranged in the shape of a horseshoe.

Count Schlemm-Nottheim was the table companion of the Baroness; he had
her tell him who the various personages from the world of ar