disperse. And perhaps it would have been well for him
to have noted these singular manifestations of conspiracy, since shortly
he was to become somewhat involved. It was growing late; so Carmichael
left the Black Eagle, nursing the sunken ember in his pipe and
surrendering no part of his dream.

Intermediately the mountaineer paid his score and started for the stairs
which led to the bedrooms above. But he stopped at the bar. A very old
man was having a pail filled with hot cabbage soup. It was the ancient
clock-mender across the way. The mountaineer was startled out of his
habitual reserve, but he recovered his composure almost instantly. The
clock-mender, his heavy glasses hanging crookedly on his nose, his whole
aspect that of a weary, broken man, took down his pail and shuffled
noiselessly out. The mountaineer followed him cautiously. Once in his
shop the clock-mender poured the steaming soup into a bowl, broke bread
in it, and began his evening meal. The other, his face pressed against
the dim pane, stared and stared.

"_Gott in Himmel!_ It is _he_!" he breathed, then stepped back into the
shadow, while the moisture from his breath slowly faded and disappeared
from the window-pane.

CHAPTER V

A COMPATRIOT

Krumerweg was indeed a crooked way. It formed a dozen elbows and ragged
half-circles as it slunk off from the Adlergasse. Streets have character
even as humans, and the Krumerweg reminded one of a person who was
afraid of being followed. The shadow of the towering bergs lay upon it,
and the few stars that peered down through the narrow crevice of
rambling gables were small, as if the brilliant planets had neither time
nor inclination to watch over such a place. And yet there lived in the
Krumerweg many a kind and loyal heart, stricken with poverty. In old
times the street had had an evil name, now it possessed only a pitiful
one.

It was half after nine when Gretchen and the vintner picked their way
over cobbles pitted here and there with mud-holes. They were arm in arm,
and they laughed when they stumbled, laughed lightly, as youth always
laughs when in love.

"Only a little farther," said Gretchen, for the vintner had never before
passed over this way.

"Long as it is and crooked, Heaven knows it is short enough!" He
encircled her with his arms and kissed her. "I love you! I love you!" he
said.

Gretchen was penetrated with rapture, for her ears, sharp with love and
the eternal doubting o