blue flower. It stabbed
him to the heart, for the maiden had thrown his rose out of the window
the moment it withered. Hastily did he close the book which only hid
Paolo's flowers. The following evening Lydia begged him to read to her
one of the sonnets of his beloved Michel Angelo. He noticed with joy
whilst he read, how tenderly her blue eyes were fixed on him, but when
he left off, to return her gaze, she murmured as if in a dream: "He is
paler." Thus it became clear to him that she only sought Paolo's
features in his own. She grew more and more sad and still. It appeared
to him as if the blooming color on her cheek paled. "She has deceived
herself," he sighed. "When the sunflower is forcibly prevented from
gazing at the sun, it withers away. Paolo will ever be her Apollo. Poor
child!" But a colder feeling entered into his own heart, he could never
rejoice in a love, which he owed to another, and which through him was
bestowed upon his brother. "She wished to marry Paolo _in effigie_," he
murmured angrily to himself, "and she does not even find the image
resembling."

CHAPTER III.

After the completion of the mysterious _exercitia_, Paul returned to
Heidelberg from Speyer. His brother found him serious, pale, but calmer
than before. Instead of the lurid passionate glare of the eye which had
so often terrified Felice, he found him at times struggling with his
tears. He did not resume his office in the Stift. The parson of a
neighboring village, who was looked upon as a Lutheran at heart, filled
that post. From the mouth of the Abbess, who had inquired into Paul's
unexpected disappearance and Lydia's sudden illness with more suspicion
than any one else and who thereby had come nearer to the truth, did he
hear of the misfortune which had befallen his beloved pupil. During her
narrative the old lady had fixed a curiously cold and searching look on
him, and her fingers played with the rosary, no longer at her side.
Luckily for him he did not at first connect this event with the
appointment made by him on the Kreuzweg, so that he was enabled to ask
in an unconstrained manner for exact details. "I heard the news on the
same day that I received your letter from Speyer," said the Countess in
a cold tone, and again she looked at him with a piercing gaze. Abashed
he rose up and hastily took his leave. It was evident that this woman
saw through him, and only had to open her mouth to ruin h