e knows nothing about such things. Suppose he is still alive--suppose
he has regained consciousness and found himself alone by the
roadside--suppose he calls her by her name? He might think she had been
injured; he might tell the doctors that there was a woman with him, and
that she must have been thrown to some distance. They will look for her.
The coachman will come back with the men he has brought, and will tell
them that she was there, unhurt--and Franz will know the truth. Franz
knows her so well--he will know that she has run away--and a great anger
will come over him. He will tell them her name in revenge. For he is
mortally injured, and it will hurt him cruelly that she has left him
alone in his last hour. He will say: "That is Mrs. Emma ------. I am her
lover. She is cowardly and stupid, too, gentlemen, for she might have
known you would not ask her name; you would be discreet; you would have
let her go away unmolested. Oh, she might at least have waited until you
came. But she is vile--utterly vile--ah!--"

"What is the matter?" asks the Professor, very gravely, rising from his
chair.

"What? What?"

"Yes, what is the matter with you?"

"Nothing." She presses the boy closer to her breast.

The Professor looks at her for a few minutes steadily.

"Didn't you know that you had fallen asleep, and--"

"Well?-- And--"

"And then you screamed out in your sleep."

"Did I?"

"You screamed as if you were having a nightmare. Were you dreaming?"

"I don't know--"

And she sees her face in a mirror opposite, a face tortured into a
ghastly smile. She knows it is her own face, and it terrifies her. She
sees that it is frozen; that this hideous smile is frozen on it, and
will always be there, all her life. She tries to cry out. Two hands are
laid on her shoulders, and between her own face and the mirrored one her
husband's face pushes its way in; his eyes pierce into hers. She knows
that unless she is strong for this last trial all is lost. And she
feels that she is strong; she has regained control of her limbs, but the
moment of strength is short. She raises her hands to his, which rest
on her shoulders; she draws him down to her, and smiles naturally and
tenderly into his eyes.

She feels his lips on her forehead, and she thinks: "It is all a
dream--he will never tell--he will never take revenge like that--he is
dead--really dead--and the dead are silent--"

"Why did you say that?" she hears her husband's