ting too much at the office. He would easily learn what
was necessary for him to know as a merchant, and arithmetic he knew
already.

The two partners, old bachelors, were delighted with the lively lad,
who came to the office with his whip in his hand and sat on his stool
as if it were a horse.

Paul Schlieben did not hear any complaints of his son; the whole
staff, men who had been ten, twenty years with the firm, all well-oiled
machines that worked irreproachably, hung round the young fellow: he
was their future chief. Everything worked smoothly.

Both father and mother were complimented on their son. "A splendid
fellow. What life there is in him." "He's only in the making," the man
would answer, but still you could see that he was pleased to hear it in
his heart. He did not feel the torturing anxiety his wife felt. Kate
only raised her eyebrows a little and gave a slight, somewhat sad smile
of consent.

She could not rejoice in the big lad any longer, as she had once
rejoiced in the little fellow on her lap. It seemed to her as though
she had altogether lost the capacity for rejoicing, slowly, it is true,
quite gradually, but still steadily, until the last remnant of the
capacity had been torn out by the roots on one particular day, in one
particular hour, at the disastrous moment when he had said: "I will go,
I want to think of my mother--where is she?" Ever since then. She still
wished him to have the best the earth could give, but she had become
more indifferent, tired. He had trodden too heavily on her heart, more
heavily than when in days gone by his small vigorous feet had stamped
on her lap.

She bent further out of the window with a deep sigh, as she waited
all alone for him. Was it not unheard of, unpardonable of him to come
home so late? Did he not know that she was waiting for him?

She clenched her hand, which rested on the windowsill, in such a
paroxysm of anger as she had rarely felt. It was foolish of her to wait
for him. Was he not old enough--eighteen? Did he still want waiting for
like a boy coming home alone from a children's party for the first
time? He had made an appointment with some other young fellows in
Berlin--who knew in what cafe they were spending their night?

She stamped her foot. Her hot breath rose like smoke in the cold
clear night in spring, she shivered with exhaustion and discomfort. And
then she thought of the hours, all the hours during which she had
watched for him al