t festival will be
when I again clasp you in my arms."

This week had expired yesterday, and Kolbielsky had not come to clasp his
loved one in his arms again. She had expected him all through the day, all
through the night, and the cause of her present deep anxiety was not
solicitude about her father, the desire to learn the result of the
conspiracy discovered; no, it was only the longing for _him_, the terrible
dread that some accident might have befallen Kolbielsky.

Why did he not come, since he had so positively promised to return at the
end of a week? Was it really only a coincidence that the day which he had
fixed for his return was the selfsame one on which the conspiracy formed by
Napoleon's foes was to break forth?

What if he had had a share in the conspiracy? If he had deceived her,
if--But no, no, that was wholly impossible--that could not be! She knew the
names of the conspirators, especially those of the heads and leaders; she
knew that Kolbielsky's name had not once been mentioned during the whole
discussion between them. So away with anxieties, away with cowardly fears.
Some accident might have detained him, might have caused a day's delay.

To-day, yes, to-day he would come at last! To-day she would see him again,
would rush into his arms, rest on his heart, never, oh! never to part from
him again! Hark, a carriage was stopping before the door! Steps echoed in
the corridor.

They approached, stopped at her door! It is he, oh, surely it is he!

Darting to the door, she tore it open.

No! It was her father, only her father!

With a troubled cry, she sank into the chair beside the door. Her father
went to her; she did not see the sorrowful, almost pitying look he fixed
upon her. She had covered her face with her hands and groaned aloud.
Schulmeister stood before her with a gloomy brow, silent and motionless.

At last, after a long pause, Leonore slowly removed her hands from her face
and raised her head.

"Are we rich now?" she asked in a whisper, as though she feared lest even
the walls should hear her question.

"Yes," he exclaimed joyfully, "yes, we are rich."

Drawing his pocketbook from his coat, he opened it and poured out its
contents, shaking the various papers with their array of high numbers into
Leonore's lap.

"Look, my daughter, my beloved child! Look at these wonderful papers. Ten
banknotes, each one fifty thousand francs. That is half a million, my
Leonore! Look at these paper