, but the heart is gone out of me. Don't be
angry and call me a coward. I tried--but I am weak now and I am
afraid. My voice is gone, and there is so little for a woman to do. I
tried everything, Velasco, but my strength--is--failing. If I could
walk, I would go to you and say good-bye; but I don't know where you
are. They say you have gone and I don't know where."

She leaned a little further forward on the sill, still hiding her eyes.
"He won't know," she whispered under her breath, "He will never know.
Velasco! Velasco--good-bye."

Her body lay across the sill now, and she opened her heavy lids and
gazed downwards, half eagerly, half fearfully. The water was dark and
the moon-light on the surface glittered. The wheel was below, huge and
gaunt like a spectre; silent, with its spokes dipping into the pool.

CHAPTER XVI

"Fraeulein, Fraeulein--open the door! There is a gentleman here who
would speak with you!--Fraeulein!"

The blows redoubled on the stout oak, growing louder and more
persistent. "Fraeulein! It is very strange, Herr Kapellmeister. I saw
her go in with my own eyes, some two hours back, and she has not come
out, for I was below in the mill with my pipe and my beer, sitting in
the very doorway itself, and no flutter of petticoats passed me, or I
should have heard."

The old miller rubbed his wizen cheeks and smoothed the wisps of hair
on his chin, nervously as a young man does his mustache.

"Na--!" said the Kapellmeister. "It is late and she may be asleep. I
came after rehearsal and it must be nine, or past. Knock louder!"

The miller struck the oak again with his fist, calling out; and then
they both listened. "There is no light through the key-hole," said the
miller, peeping, "only the moon-rays which lie on the floor, and when I
hark with my hand to my ear, I hear no sound but the water splashing."

The Kapellmeister paced the narrow corridor impatiently.
"Donnerwetter!" he exclaimed, "The matter is important, or I shouldn't
have come. I must have an answer to-night. Try the door, and if it is
unlocked, open it and shout. You have a voice like a saw; it would
raise the dead."

The miller put his hand to the latch and it yielded: "Fraeulein--!" The
garret was in shadow, and across the floor lay the moonbeams
glittering; the casement was open, and the geraniums were outlined dark
against the sky, their colour dimmed.

"There is something in the window!" said the mil