d received various instructions relative to
the departure of the elder son. An hour later he returned, having
performed his duties. He told how Fritz Nettenmair was looking forward
to his new life in America. They would be astonished when they saw him
again. He could hardly await the time. The old gentleman's courage
revived. Grimly he commanded Apollonius to go to bed; the work they
had begun could be continued another time.

Disquieted, like a tortured spirit, now wringing his hands, now
clenching his fists, Fritz Nettenmair wandered from the shed to the
house and from the house again to the shed. With each round he made,
his soul rose up in the wildest defiance and sank again into
despairing helplessness. His heart cried out for a word of love. His
arms stretched out convulsively to press something to his heart which
was his, that he might know he was not lost. For nobody is lost who
has somebody in the world to love. Endowed of a sudden with renewed
strength, he hastened through the house door into the room where his
children lay. A night-light protected by a shade shone brightly enough
for the father to see his children. He sank on his knees before the
nearest little bed. A long forgotten sound rose to his lips and he
whispered it, yearningly as never before. "Fritz!" He only wanted to
clasp his children to his heart once, to see their love and then to
go; to go and become another man, a better one, a happier one. The
little fellow awakened: he thought his mother had called. Smilingly he
opened his eyes and--shivered with fright. He feared the man standing
at his bedside; one he knew so well, and yet more strange than a
stranger to him. It was the man who had given him such angry glances,
the man from whom his mother had locked him in his room that he might
not see what the man did to her. But he had got up trembling and
listened at the door; and clenched his little fists in powerless rage.

"Fritz," said the father anxiously, "I am going away and I shall not
come back. But I will send you beautiful apples and picture-books, and
think of you a thousand times a minute."

"I don't want them," replied the boy, frightened but defiant. "Uncle
'Lonius gives me apples. I don't want yours."

"Don't you love me either?" asked the father in a breaking voice at
the second little bed. George took flight into his brother's bed.
There the children clung to each other in fright. Scorn and repugnance
were reflected in George's