am in your power as
completely as the humblest slave in the palace is in that of the Emperor.
Keep the gem, and use it and this fateful gold trifle till the day shall
come when my weal and woe are one with yours."

"For your dead father's sake," she answered, coloring deeply, "your weal
lies already very near my heart. Am not I, who brought upon you your
father's curse, bound indeed to help you to free yourself from the burden
of it? And it may perhaps be in my power to do so, Orion, if you do not
scorn to listen to the counsels of an ignorant girl?"

"Speak," he cried; but she did not reply immediately. She only begged him
to come into the garden with her; the close atmosphere of the room had
become intolerable to both, and when they got out and Katharina had first
caught sight of them their flushed cheeks had not escaped her watchful
eye.

In the open air, a scarcely perceptible breath from the river moderated
the noontide heat, and then Paula found courage to tell him what
Philippus had called his apprehension in life. It was not new to him;
indeed it fully answered to the principles he had laid down for the
future. He accepted it gratefully: "Life is a function, a ministry, a
duty!" the words were a motto, a precept that should aid him in carrying
out his plans.

"And the device," he exclaimed, "will be doubly precious to me as having
come from your lips.--But I no longer need its warning. The wisest and
most practical axioms of conduct never made any man the better. Who does
not bring a stock of them with him when he quits school for the world at
large? Precepts are of no use unless, in the voyage of life, a manly will
holds the rudder. I have called on mine, and it will steer me to the
goal, for a bright guiding star lights the pilot on his way. You know
that star; it is. . . ."

"It is what you call your love," she interposed, with a deep blush.--Your
love for me, and I will trust it."

"You will!" he cried passionately. "You allow me to hope. . . ."

"Yes, yes, hope!" she again broke in, "but meanwhile. . . ."

"Meanwhile," he said, "'do not press me further,' ought to end your
sentence. Oh! I quite understand you; and until I feel that you have good
reason once more to respect the maniac who lost you by his own fault, I,
who fought you like your most deadly foe, will not even speak the final
word. I will silence my longing, I will try. . . ."

"You will try to show me--nay, you will show me--that in y