expressly to suit my convenience.
"You will only meet the members of my family," he said, "and a cousin of
my wife's who is here with her daughter, on a visit to us--Frau Meyer, of
Wurzburg."

I accepted the invitation, feeling privately an Englishman's reluctance
to confronting an assembly of strangers, and anticipating nothing
remarkable in reference to Frau Meyer, although she did come from
Wurzburg. Even when I was presented to the ladies in due form, as "the
honored representative of Mr. Keller, of Frankfort," I was too stupid, or
too much absorbed in the business on which I had been engaged, to be much
struck by the sudden interest with which Frau Meyer regarded me. She was
a fat florid old lady, who looked coarsely clever and resolute; and she
had a daughter who promised to resemble her but too faithfully, in due
course of time. It was a relief to me, at dinner, to find myself placed
between the merchant's wife and her eldest son. They were far more
attractive neighbors at table, to my thinking, than Frau Meyer.

Dinner being over, we withdrew to another room to take our coffee. The
merchant and his son, both ardent musicians in their leisure hours,
played a sonata for pianoforte and violin. I was at the opposite
extremity of the room, looking at some fine proof impressions of prints
from the old masters, when a voice at my side startled me by an
unexpected question.

"May I ask, sir, if you are acquainted with Mr. Keller's son?"

I looked round, and discovered Frau Meyer.

"Have you seen him lately?" she proceeded, when I had acknowledged that I
was acquainted with Fritz. "And can you tell me where he is now?"

I answered both these questions. Frau Meyer looked thoroughly well
satisfied with me. "Let us have a little talk," she said, and seated
herself, and signed to me to take a chair near her.

"I feel a true interest in Fritz," she resumed, lowering her voice so as
not to be heard by the musicians at the other end of the room. "Until
to-day, I have heard nothing of him since he left Wurzburg. I like to
talk about him--he once did me a kindness a long time since. I suppose
you are in his confidence? Has he told you why his father sent him away
from the University?"

My reply to this was, I am afraid, rather absently given. The truth is,
my mind was running on some earlier words which had dropped from the old
lady's lips. "He once did me a kindness a long time since." When had I
last heard that common