not bound to his parents' house by a
hundred ties? It was not _his_ parents' house, that was just
the point. Maybe he unconsciously felt that the soil there was not his
native soil--and now he was seeking, wandering.

Kate pondered, her head resting heavily in her hand: what was she to
do first? Should she confess to him where he came from? Tell him
everything? Perhaps things would be better then. But oh, it was so
difficult. But it must be done. She must not remain silent any longer.
She felt her trembling heart grow stronger, as she made the firm
resolve to speak to him when he returned home. What she had kept as the
greatest secret, what she had guarded with trembling, what nothing
could have torn from her, as she thought, she was now prepared to
reveal of her own free will. She must do so. Otherwise how could things
ever be better? How could they ever end happily, or ever end at
all?

Her eyes wandered about seeking something fervently; there was a
terrified expression in them. But there was no other way out. Kate
Schlieben prepared herself for the confession with a resoluteness that
she would not have been capable of a year ago. For one moment the wish
came to her to call Paul to help her. But she rejected the thought
quickly--had he ever loved Wolfgang as she had done? Perhaps it would
be a matter of no moment to him--no, perhaps it would be a triumph to
him, he had always been of a different opinion to her. And then another
thing. He might perhaps forestall her, tell Wolfgang himself, and he
must not do that. She, she alone must do that, with all the love of
which she was still capable, so that it might be told him in a
forbearing, merciful and tender manner.

She ran hastily across to her sitting-room. She kept the certificate
of his baptism and the deed of surrender they had got from his native
village in her writing-desk there; she had not even trusted
the papers to her husband. Now she brought them out and put them ready.
She would have to show him that everything was as she said.

The papers rustled in her trembling hands, but she repressed her
agitation. She must be calm, quite calm and sensible; she must throw
down the castle in the air she had built for herself and that had not
turned out as in her dreams, knowing fully what she was doing. But even
if this castle in the air collapsed, could not something be saved from
the ruins? Something good rise from them? He would be grateful to her,
he must be