her on all sides. The sun shone
brightly and warmly, but from the water there blew a brisk,
invigorating breeze.

She gazed at the quiet river flecked with spots of white foam and at
the indistinct silhouettes of boats trailing along in midstream. She
breathed in deeply the calm that surrounded her and felt a
resurgence of her wasted strength.

Janina lay down upon the yellowish sand of the bank and, gazing at
the gleaming expanse of waters, forgot everything. It seemed to her
as though she were flowing on with the current of the river, passing
the shores, houses, and woods and hurrying on continually into a
blue and boundless distance like the illimitable expanse of heaven
that hung over her. It seemed to her as though she no longer
remembered anything, but felt only the ineffable delight of rocking
with the waves.

Janina suddenly awoke from that half dream, for there passed near
her an old man with a fishing rod in his hand. He looked at her in
passing, sat down almost beside her on the very edge of the river,
cast his line into the water and waited.

He had so honest a face that she felt a desire to speak to him and
was thinking how to begin, when he addressed her first: "Would you
like to take a trip over to the other side?"

Janina glanced at him questioningly.

"Aha! I see that we don't understand each other. I thought that you
wanted to drown yourself," he said.

"I wasn't even thinking about death," she replied quietly.

"Ha! ha! It would be an unexpected honor for the river."

He adjusted his fishing tackle and became silent, centering all his
attention on the fish that had begun to circle about the bait and
the hook.

A deeper silence, as it were, diffused itself about and began to
fill Janina's soul with a blissful calm. She felt that an immense
goodness was pervading her, that the majesty of that expanse of
heaven, of the waters and the verdure was uplifting her and drawing
from her breast a hymn of thanksgiving and the pure joy of living,
free from all earthly things.

The old man cast a sidelong glance at her and on his narrow lips
there hovered an unfathomable smile.

Janina felt that look and in turn glanced at him. Their eyes met in
a long and friendly gaze.

She felt a sudden and irresistible impulse to reveal the depths of
her soul to him.

She moved closer to him and said quietly: "I was not thinking about
death."

"Then you were seeking calm?"

"Yes, I wanted to take a look