ising her hands! "Jesus! Maria! Joseph!
but you've been spoiled in the city! I'd rather go home again without
seeing him."

"Well, then, do your own thinking, you psalm-singer."

"So I will," said Emmerence, going. She took her way straight to the
convent, asked to see the principal, and told him frankly that she
wished to talk to Ivo.

"Are you his sister?" asked the principal.

"No: I'm only the housemaid."

The principal looked steadily into her face: she returned his look so
calmly and naturally that his suspicions, if he had any, were disarmed;
and he directed the famulus to conduct her to Ivo.

She waited for him in the recess of a window on the long vaulted
corridor. He came presently, and started visibly when he saw her.

"Why, Emmerence, what brings you here? All well at home, I hope?" said
he, with a foreboding of evil.

"Yes, all well. Your mother sent me to give you a thousand loves from
her, and to say that Ivo needn't be a clerical man if he doesn't want
to be one with all his heart. Mother can't make her mind easy: she
thinks she has made his heart so heavy, and that he only does so to
please her, and that was what she didn't want, and he was her dear son
for all that, even if he shouldn't be a minister, and----Yes: that's
all."

"Don't look so frightened, Emmerence: talk without fear. Give me your
hand," said Ivo, just as one of his inquisitive comrades had passed.
"We are not strangers: we are good old friends, a'n't we?"

Emmerence now related, with astonishing facility, how she had tried to
write the letter, and had wandered all night to see him: she often
looked to the ground and turned her head as if in quest of something.
Ivo's eyes rested on her with strange intentness, and whenever their
glances met both blushed deeply; yet they had a dread of each other,
and neither confessed the emotions of their hearts. When her story was
all told, Ivo said, "Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I only hope
a time may come when I may requite a little of your kindness."

"That's nothing. If it was for your good, and you were to say, 'Just
run to Stuttgard for me to the king,' I'd go in a minute. I just have a
feeling now as if--as if----"

"As if what?" asked Ivo.

"As if every thing must turn out for the very best after this."

Without speaking a word, the two stood face to face for a while,
holding in their hearts the fondest converse. At last Ivo drew himself
up, with a heavy sigh, and sa