"When I heard you speak, I felt as if my mother had died a second time," said Lenz.
"Don't be so melancholy all of a sudden," said Annele more graciously. "I will show all respect for the portrait, and hang it up over my bed. Come, you are no longer sad? You have been so loveable to-day, and really now, when I look again at the picture, I think it does remind me of your mother."
Just as Lenz first became as hot as fire, and then as cold as ice, so could Annele influence him as she chose, making him at one moment feel the happiest of men, and the next giving him deadly offence.
And thus it went on for weeks and months; but the prevailing feeling, however, was happiness, for Annele showed a degree of gentleness that no one had ever suspected she possessed. Even Pilgrim came one day to Lenz and said:—"Some men are happy when they see how wise they have been; I rejoice that I have been a fool."
"Really? on what subject?"
"No one can understand a young girl's disposition. I do think that in Annele's character, there is something that can make you entirely happy. It is, perhaps, fortunate that she is not so tender hearted as you."
"I thank you, Pilgrim; I am truly glad that you think so," cried Lenz, and the two friends grasped each other's hands affectionately.