assed
the market-place, many faces peered out at her from the venders' booths,
and one friendly peasant woman called to her to take shelter, but
Wilhelmine shook her head and hastened onwards. She feared that her
shoeless feet would awaken curiosity, and she dared not let the people
see her torn garments as they assuredly would did she tarry in the booth,
for in their homely kindness they would insist on removing her wet cloak.

The Rathaus clock chimed the hour, and Wilhelmine realised with a
strange, dream-like feeling that but three hours had gone by since she
passed that way to visit Monsieur Gabriel. Yet it seemed to her as
though days had elapsed since she sang the _Ave Maria_ in the cathedral.
At length she reached the door of her mother's house. She knocked loudly,
wondering if Frau von Graevenitz had watched her from the windows of the
upper story, which commanded a view of part of the market-place and the
door of the Rathaus, where she had received her brother's letter that
morning. She knocked again and tried to lift the latch, but it was
secured within. She listened, but could hear no approaching footsteps in
the corridor. She leaned against the portal, and wondered if it was her
fate to remain in the snow for the rest of the day.

Suddenly a thought came to her, which sent the blood tingling in a hot
wave to her cheeks: Where was her brother's letter? She felt for it in
her bosom; it was not there, and she knew the precious missive must have
fallen from her gown during the struggle at the Pfarrhaus. Could she go
back and fetch it? she asked herself. No! that was out of the question.

At this moment the door was flung open and Frau von Graevenitz appeared.
'Lord God!' she said, when she saw Wilhelmine standing on the threshold,
'where have you been child? Surely your dear Monsieur Gabriel could keep
you in the schoolhouse till this storm passed over, and not send you back
to catch your death of cold or cost me an apothecary's fee!'

Wilhelmine pushed past her mother without a word, designing to gain her
chamber before the old woman observed her torn garments and her lack of
shoes; but Frau von Graevenitz clutched hold of the cloak and, giving it a
vicious pull, exclaimed: 'No, no! I will not permit you to take your
soaking clothes upstairs. Come in here and take them off.' She tugged at
the heavy cloak with such vehemence that the clasp at her neck parted and
the cape fell back, revealing Wilhelmine's loos