ess; as long as the girl was in this state
of excitement I could not step up to her, and say: 'Susanna, what have
you done? You have given your word to a man of honor, and you love
another! You have made mischief in the house which was so hospitably
opened to you; you have made three human hearts miserable! Is that your
gratitude for all this kindness?'

"And then her cry, 'No one asked me; they pushed me away where they
wanted me to be, and I had not the power to defend myself!' sank deeply
into my heart, and my thoughts went back to that evening when she had
run away in the storm and rain, and how Klaus had brought her back, and
called her 'his!' Had he asked if she loved him? No; he had not even
thought of the possibility that such might not be the case; he had gone
away with firm confidence in her love. And then Anna Maria had pressed
her to her heart one day, and called her 'sister,' and Klaus had come,
and had put the engagement ring on her hand. She had not dared to send
him away, and had gone on, in her light manner, trifling with that
engagement ring, while becoming deeper and deeper involved in the
passion for another. Her lover was away, he did not hear her. Now
Stuermer was going into the wide world, a fresh thorn in her heart.
Susanna was shaken out of her dreams, and near despair. And Anna Maria,
and Klaus--what was to become of them?

"Then Brockelmann brought me a letter from Stuermer. I went into my room
and read it; it was written from Dambitz, and ran as follows:

"'HONORED FRAeULEIN:--I do not like to go away from you without
a word of explanation, or without thanking you for your letter,
which kept me from taking a step which would have been
painfully hard for me in more than one respect. You have, with
delicate tact indeed, rightly discerned that Susanna Mattoni is
not an object of indifference to me, and you wanted to save me
from a disappointment. My dear Fraeulein Rosamond, why should I
deny it? I love Susanna very much, and I intended yesterday to
beg for your mediation in my suit. I _had_ to suppose that she
returned my love.

"'I have no luck in your house--a second time I have been
bitterly undeceived. Now I have come to consider myself one of
the most arrogant men the world contains. Anna Maria does not
love me. I required years to get over that first
disappointment; it was not easy, for I believed myself
p