his natural champion, from whose
presence he might draw new strength, desert her colors?

"Come. Compose yourself. Turn your eyes away from that glorified
face--it moves you too deeply. Oh! dearest Leah, you're not the first
who has learned from the dead, what we owe to the living. I've sat in
this very chair through many an hour of bitter conflict, when I knew
not what to do; and when it has sometimes happened that my dear wife
and I did not agree, we came quietly up here, first I, and ere long
she, and we soon saw clearly what we ought to do. You know yourself,
dear friend, every thing in life is not as plain as a sum in
arithmetic, where we only need to write down the fraction that is left
over. Therefore we must question our dead, our immortal ones, and they
will not leave us long in doubt about the answer."

He had taken both her hands, and was gazing down at her with a look of
the tenderest love. She suddenly rose and threw her arms around his
neck. "Dear--true--only friend," was all she could falter amid her
sobs.

After a time some one knocked gently at the door, and Reginchen's voice
said that her father was going and wanted to take leave of Reinhold. As
there was no sound from the attic room, the little wife then opened the
door and timidly entered.

Reinhold gently released himself from Leah, who was still clinging to
him in violent agitation. "Do you take charge of her now," he said to
Reginchen, "we shall keep her."

"I knew it, Reinhold," replied the little wife, smiling through her
tears; "you don't talk often, but when you do speak, you can move
mountains. Has he turned your heart, you naughty woman, when you
wouldn't be touched by my fondest words? Now I find her here on the
most affectionate terms with my own husband, and must get jealous of my
only friend forsooth, in my old age."

Long after Reinhold had left the house and was on his way to the
railway station with his father-in-law, who understood nothing about
the matter, the two friends remained clasped in each other's arms, Leah
seated in the lap of Reginchen, who often pressed her to her heart with
almost motherly tenderness. They said nothing, but leaned their heads
against each other and looked up to the bracket from which the dead
man's gentle face gazed down upon them in pure and calm majesty.

CHAPTER VII.

Meantime the two friends had spent their day in a somewhat grave mood.

It was easy to