eally, is charming."

"There I agree with you."

"She is wonderfully well-bred--I do not understand it. I could pass
her, anywhere, for a distinguished foreigner--a foreigner of noble
birth."

The father of the subject of her praise smiled gravely. "That is very
true. She will--what you call it?--look the part."

"But to be quite frank," the lady went on "you, yourself, are quite
impossible, Herr Kreutzer. Quite impossible, I must assure you."

"I, impossible? I--you say that I am quite impossible?"

She nodded very positively. "I don't like to hurt your feelings, my
dear man; but I must make you understand. I can't have people saying
that my dear son's father-in-law is a shabby old musician--a
flute-player in a theatre. You see that clearly, don't you. How could
I--"

"It is quite true," Herr Kreutzer admitted humbly. "I am a shabby old
flute-player and you do not make it quite as bad as it is really,
Madame." He looked at her and smiled a rueful smile. "It is not even a
theatre in which I play, Madame, it is a beer-garden."

"A beer-garden!" she cried in horror. "Oh--Herr Kreutzer! Worse and
worse!" Then, wheedlingly: "Listen. You say you love your daughter."

"Yes; surely; I love my daughter very dearly--almost as much, perhaps,
as Madame loves her son. Almost. Almost."

"You would have gone to prison for her."

"Yes; to prison. Gladly would I go to prison for my Anna, if, by doing
so, I could save her one moment's pain."

"Well, I'm going to suggest a thing not half so hard as that. I will
give consent to my son's marriage to your daughter if you will agree
to give her up entirely--to give her up _entirely_. You understand?
You must never see her any more."

This was too much. The old man drew back with a cry of pain. "I give
my Anna up! I never see her any more! Madame, do you know what you
ask?"

She was not vividly impressed. "I suppose it may be hard, at first,"
she went on, casually, "but--"

He interrupted. "Hard! I am old--and poor. I have
nothing--nothing--but that little girl. All my whole life long I work
for her. My love for her has grown so close--close--close around my
heart that from my breast you could not tear it out without, at the
same time, tearing from that breast the heart itself. You hear,
Madame? She is my soul--my life--all I have got--all--all--"

"But am I not giving up a great deal, too? I had hoped my son would
marry well--perhaps, even, among the foreign nobility. Th