seemed, as it
were, lightly sketched with a faint stroke to be more strongly marked
later, and which were now visible only in a side-light, the creased
appearance of the lower eyelids and the space between the inner corners
of the eyes and the bridge of the nose, the granulated condition of the
smoothly shaven cheeks, which resembled the peel of ripe oranges or fine
Morocco leather; the flabbiness of the narrow strip of skin between the
edge of the beard and the ears, which looked as if it had been lightly
powdered with greyish-yellow dust; the pallor near the cheek-bone, which
was as colourless and withered as a dead tea-rose leaf. He counted the
white hairs already visible on the temples--he pulled out the ones in the
moustache--let the sunbeams play over his hair and, turning and bending
his head, saw that it was growing thinner and, from the brow to the
crown, showed the smooth scalp shining through. The investigation lasted
a long while, he performed it with cruel thoroughness, locking himself
into his room meanwhile, since he would not allow even his valet to be a
witness of the painful discoveries of which he believed that he alone was
aware.

Perhaps he was not mistaken in this comforting supposition. His
appearance as a whole was still handsome and stately. Time had not
marred the lines of his slender figure, no increase of flesh enlarged his
girth, no weakness made his shoulders droop and rounded his back, and
when dressed with exquisite taste, and carrying his head proudly erect,
he walked with a light, elastic step through the streets or across the
carpet of a drawing-room, he would have been taken at a distance, or if
one was a little near-sighted, not only for a handsome man, but even for
one still young.

He said this to himself when, after a few minutes of discouragement, he
rose from the arm-chair, hastily completed his toilet, and again looked
at the whole effect in the mirror, this time not close at hand, but from
a distance of several paces.

Some one knocked at the door. "The doctor," said the servant's voice.

"I'm coming," replied Baron Robert, hastening to open the door and enter
the adjoining drawing-room, where Dr. Thiel was awaiting him. He came
regularly one morning every week to see the baron before the latter went
out; for Baron Robert was a little anxious about his health, and liked to
be told by the physician, who was also his friend, that certain trifling
symptoms--great thirs