tire!" he said half aloud to himself, and the consciousness
of youthful vigor supported him. He felt that on the next day he could
meet the problems before him full of fresh courage; and one thought
above all others strengthened him, and lightened his heart: he had
remained faithful to the truth, and so should it always be. Truth is
that firm standpoint of mother-earth where the wrestling spirit is not
to be conquered and thrown.

In the distance, from the railway station across the river, he now
heard an idle locomotive blowing off steam. It snorted, shrieked, and
panted like a fabulous monster; and Eric thought. This engine has all
day been drawing trains of cars in which hundreds of human beings had,
for the time, been seated, and now it is resting and letting off its
hot steam. He smiled as he thought that he himself was almost such a
locomotive, and was now cooling himself, to be fired up anew on the
morrow.

Suddenly he was waked from sleep; for he had slept without intending to
do so. A servant announced that Frau Sonnenkamp wished to speak to him.

CHAPTER IX.

A TWILIGHT RIDDLE.

The sun had set, but a golden haze enveloped valley, mountain and
river, when Eric went with the servant, and from the corridor looked
out over the distant prospect. He was conducted through several rooms.
In the last, where a ground-glass hanging-lamp was lighted, he heard
the words, "I thank you,--be seated."

He saw Frau Ceres reclining on a divan, a large rocking-chair standing
before her. Eric sat down.

"I have remained at home on your account," Frau Ceres began; she had a
feeble, timid voice, and it was evidently, difficult for her to speak.

Eric was at a loss what to reply.

Suddenly she sat upright, and asked,--

"Are you acquainted with my daughter?"

"No."

"But you've been to the convent on the island?"

"Yes; I had a greeting to deliver from my mother to the Lady
Superior--nothing farther."

"I believe you. I am not the cause of her becoming a nun--no, not I--do
not think it," and reclining again on the pillow, Frau Ceres
continued,--

"I warn you, captain, not to remain here with us. I have been informed
of nothing--he has let me be informed of nothing--but do not stay with
us, if you can find any other employment in the world. What is your
purpose in coming into this house?"

"Because I thought--until an hour ago I believed--that I co