sheep from the goats. And finally, granting talent, how was the young
man equipped in the matter of moral energy? There, indisputably, the
core of the problem was to be sought. Or didn't he, perhaps, think so?

As through a fog Daniel observed that the little girl had approached him
and looked him over with a curiously cold and testing glance. Almost he
was impelled to stretch out his hand and cover the eyes of the child,
whose manner was uncanny to him through some ghostly presentiment.

"I'm truly sorry that I can't give you a more encouraging outlook."
Andreas Doederlein's voice was oily, and showed a conscious delight in
its own sound. "But as I said, there's nothing to be done until autumn.
Suppose you leave me your address. Put it down on this slip. No? Well,
quite as you wish. Good-bye, young man, good-bye."

Doederlein accompanied him to the door. Then he returned to his daughter,
took her on his knee, picked up the doll, and said: "Human beings, my
dear Dorothea, are a wretched set. If I were to compare them to sparrows
on the road, I should be doing the sparrows but little honour. Heavens
and earth! Wouldn't even write his name on a slip of paper. Felt hurt!
Well, well, well. What funny creatures men are. Wouldn't leave his name.
Well, well."

He hummed the Walhalla motif, and Dorothea, bending over her doll,
coquettishly kissed the waxen face.

Daniel, standing in front of the house, bit his lips like a man in a
fever who does not want his teeth to rattle. Why, the depth of his soul
asked him, why did you sit in their counting-houses and waste their
time? Why did you crucify your body and bind my wings? Why were you deaf
to me and desirous of gathering fruits where there are only stones? Why
did you, like a coward, flee from your fate to their offices and
ware-houses and iron safes and all their doleful business? For the sake
of this hour? Poor fool!

And he answered: "Never again, my soul, never again."

XI

In the beginning Marian had received a letter from Daniel every now and
then. These letters became rarer. During the second year he wrote only
once--a few lines at Christmas.

At the time when he was leaving his last place of employment he wrote
her on a postcard that he was changing his residence again. But he did
not tell her that he was going to Nuremberg. So spring passed and
summer. Then her soul, which was wavering between fear and hope, was
rudely jol