cond-rate musician in
his studio again and give him a piece of my mind. In the meantime be
calm, my child, be calm," said he, stroking her brown hair, "Old
Carovius is still alive."

Dorothea nestled up to him, and smiled: "What would you say, Uncle," she
began with a knavish and at the same time unusually attentive expression
in her face, "if I were to marry Daniel Nothafft? You like him," she
continued in a flattering tone, and held him fast by the shoulder when
he started back, "you like him, I know you do. I must marry somebody;
for I do not wish to be an old maid, and I can't stand Father any
longer."

Herr Carovius tore himself loose from her. "To the insane asylum with
you!" he cried. "I would rather see you go to bed with that meal sack.
Is the Devil in you, you prostitute? If your skin itches, scratch it, so
far as I am concerned, but take a stable boy to do it, as Empress
Katherine of blessed memory did. Buy fine dresses, bedizen yourself with
tom-foolery of all shades and colours, go to dances and lap up
champagne, make music or throw your damn fiddle on the dung heap, do
anything you want to do, I'll pay for it; but that green-eyed phantast,
that lunk-headed rat-catcher, that woman-eater and music-box bird, no,
no! Never! Send him humping down the stairs and out the front door! For
God's sake and the sake of all the saints, don't marry him! Don't, I
say. If you do, it's all off between you and me."

There was such a look of hate and fear in Herr Carovius's face that
Dorothea was almost frightened. His hair was as towsled as the twigs of
an abandoned bird's nest; water was dripping from the corners of his
mouth; his eyes were inflamed; his glasses were on the tip of his nose.

Nothing could have made Dorothea more pleased with the story Daniel had
told her than Herr Carovius's ravings. Her eyes were opened wide, her
mouth was thirsty. If she had hesitated at times before, she did so no
more. She loved money; greed was a part of her make-up from the hour
she was born. But if Herr Carovius had laid the whole of his treasures
at her feet, and said to her, "You may have them if you will renounce
Daniel Nothafft," she would have replied, "Your money, my Daniel."

Something terribly strange and strong drew her to the man she had just
heard so volubly cursed. That sensual prickling was of a more dangerous
violence and warmth in his presence than in that of any other man she
had ever known; and she had known a n