, when she had
wished to pass through the dark living-room to the brightly lighted
nursery. A flash darted across the sky and snatched the darkness, like
a black coverlet, from the pond, from the willows pensively bending
over the reeds, from the water-lilies lying quietly in all the
blackness; but all this seemed as strange to Billy as if she had never
seen it. She hastened farther, thinking and feeling but one thing: to
be there by the lime-tree with him--there was security, there the storm
would have been weathered. As she issued from the park, another flash
illumined the landscape, and she saw a black figure, the pointed hood
of the rain-coat drawn over the head, leaning against the trunk of the
lime-tree.

"Boris!" Billy cried out.

"Hush," answered Boris, "come." He laid her arm in his and drew her
away with him. They walked over a damp meadow, then along a field of
barley, where a corncrake rattled excitedly as if giving a signal.

"Where are we going?" asked Billy in a low voice.

Boris stopped. "You ask?" he said; "if you are afraid, I will lead you
back. I will lead you to the house, you may be sure; there is still
time."

"And you?" asked Billy hesitatingly.

"Ah, I!" replied Boris, and that sounded so sorrowful, so infinitely
lonely, that Billy was again thrilled by that painful admiring
compassion, which made her quite defenseless against Boris.

"No, no," she cried, "let us go."

They now crossed a piece of swampy land which was white with
cotton-grass and softly smacked under their tread.

"That sounds," remarked Billy, "like the kisses chambermaids talk
about," and she laughed at it. She felt strongly the need of laughing,
of saying something jolly. Beyond the swamp the woods began. Boris
stopped now and then to get his bearings in the darkness; he whistled
once softly, and a whistle answered. At last they came on the forest
road to a carriage; a man stood there--Billy saw this for an instant
in the gleam of a flash of lightning, then again profound gloom.
Boris spoke in an undertone with somebody; they were talking of the
thunder-storm and bad roads. She heard horses rattle their harness,
then Boris pushed her into the carriage, climbed in himself, slammed
the door, and the conveyance slowly got in motion on the uneven
forest-road.

[Illustration: THE GOSSIPS.]
Friedrich Wahlte

The carriage was cramped and dark, the raised windows rattled softly,
and beyond them lay the woods and the ni