feelings come.
You must become low-spirited in this old nest; you have no companions of
your own age, you withdraw more and more from every youthful pleasure,
and, although you think you can do without these things, you will have
to pay for it some day."

Anna Maria shook her head.

"Yes, yes!" he continued, stepping in front of the window, and his tall
figure obstructed the sunlight so that the room grew dark all at once.
"I have seen more of life, I know it. What should you think, Anna Maria,
if you--" He paused and drew a letter from his pocket. "I had better
read the letter to you. I was just looking for you, to talk with you
about it. Professor Mattoni is dead!"

Anna Maria looked over to him sympathetically. Klaus had turned around
and was looking out of the window; the paper in his hand shook slightly.
She knew how deeply the news of this death touched him. Professor
Mattoni had been his tutor, had lived in Buetze for years, and the
pleasantest memories of his boyhood were connected with this man. As a
youth he had had in him a truly fatherly friend and adviser, and had
since visited him every year, in Berlin, where he held a position as
professor in the E---- Institute.

Anna Maria took her brother's hand and pressed it silently. "Yet one
true friend less," she then said; "we shall soon be quite alone, Klaus!"

"He was more than a friend to me, Anna Maria," he replied gently, "he
was a father to me."

She nodded; she knew it well. "And the letter?" she asked.

"A last request, almost illegible; he wishes that I should take charge
of his little daughter, till she--so he writes--till she is independent
enough to take up the battle of life."

"His little daughter?" asked Anna Maria. "Had he still so young a
child?"

"I am sorry to say," said Klaus, "that I know nothing at all of his
family affairs. He married late in life, and probably had every reason
for not presenting his better half: some said he picked her up somewhere
in Hungary; others, that she had been a chorus singer in one of the
inferior theatres in Berlin. I never spoke to him about it, and when I
went to his house I saw in his study no indications that any female
being presided there. I have never noticed anything on my frequent
visits to show that such a person lived with Mattoni, and remember just
once that while we were having a pleasant hour's chat, a child's cry
came from the next room, whereupon he got up and knocked emphatically on