s on? All the news you
hear and who you see and everything."----

"Be sure you write," said Madeleine, too, when he saw her off early in
the morning to Berlin, where she was to meet her English charges.
"Christiania, POSTE RESTANTE, till the first, and then Bergen. 'FROKEN
WADE,' don't forget."

The train started; her handkerchief fluttered from the window until the
carriage was out of sight.

Maurice was alone; every one he knew disappeared, even Furst, who had
obtained a holiday engagement in a villa near Dresden. An odd stillness
reigned in the BRAUSTRASSE and its neighbourhood; from houses which had
hitherto been clangrous with musical noises, not a sound issued.
Familiar rooms and lodgings were either closely shuttered, or, in
process of scouring, hung out their curtains to flutter on the sill.

The days passed, unmarked, eventless, like the uniform pages of a dull
book. When the solitude grew unbearable, Maurice went to visit Frau
Furst, and had his supper with the family. He was a welcome guest, for
he not only paid for all the beer that was drunk, but also brought such
a generous portion of sausage for his own supper, that it supplied one
or other of the little girls as well. Afterwards, they sat round the
kitchen-table, listening, the children with the old-fashioned solemnity
that characterised them, to Frau Furst's reminiscences. Otherwise, he
hardly exchanged a word with anyone, but sat at his piano the livelong
day. Of late, Schwarz had been somewhat cool and off-hand in manner
with him; the master had also not displayed the same detailed interest
in his plans for the summer, as in those of the rest of the class. This
was one reason why he had not gone away like every one else; the other,
that he had been unwilling to write home for an increase of allowance.
Sometimes, when the day was hot, he envied his friends refreshing
themselves by wood, mountain or sea; but, in the main, he worked
briskly at Czerny's FINGERFERTIGKEIT, and with such perseverance that
ultimately his fingers stumbled from fatigue.

With the beginning of August, the heat grew oppressive; all day long,
the sun beat, fierce and unremittent, on this city of the plains, and
the baked pavements were warm to the feet. Business slackened, and the
midday rest in shops and offices was extended beyond its usual limit.
Conservatorium and Gewandhaus, at first given over to relays of
charwomen, their brooms and buckets, soon lay dead and deserted,