hair, and forced
her to listen to the voice of her own thoughts: Annele, what change has
come over you? The gay, handsome Annele, whom all loved and flattered,
sitting here in a darkened chamber of a lonely house, having to delve
and to save!--I would not mind that; I would do it gladly, if I were
but honored in the household. But nothing I do or say suits him. What
do I do that is wrong? Am I not frugal and industrious, willing to work
even more than I do? But this place is like a grave.--

She started, trembling, from her seat. A dream she had had in the night
came vividly to mind,--not a dream, this time, of merry parties or
flattering guests, but of her own open grave. She had stood beside it,
and distinctly seen the little clods of earth rolling down into the pit
that had been dug for her. She screamed aloud and stood as one
paralyzed.

With an effort she recovered herself; all the life within her cried: "I
will not die, not yet; for I have not yet lived, either at home or
here."

She wept in deep compassion with herself as her thoughts travelled back
over the years that were gone. She had imagined life would be so happy
alone with the man she loved, far away from the world; from the
publicity that had grown irksome to her, and the undefined feeling of
insecurity that had begun to poison her enjoyment of the profusion
about her. It was her husband's fault that she longed now for a wider
field in which to use her wasted powers. He was like his own clocks,
that play their little tunes, but hear nothing beyond. The comparison
made her laugh in the midst of her wretchedness.

She would gladly have yielded obedience to one who showed himself a
master among men, but not to a miserable sticker of pins.

Yet you knew who and what he was, whispered something in her heart.

Yes, but not like this, not like this, she answered.

Has he not a good heart?

Towards every one but me. No one who has not lived with him knows his
many whims, his frightful bursts of passion. This clock-making is
fatal; we must try another mode of life.

This was the point to which Annele's thoughts always reverted. If she
could only be a landlady at the head of the first establishment in the
country; could only be earning some money and have some communication
with the world, happy days would come again.

She went to the glass and rearranged her dress. She could never go
about in any slatternly fashion; no slippers for her, though Lenz oft