"And it hurts me more than all," Adela went on in an agitated way, "that you, who have been my good comrade ever since we were little children, should think all manner of ill of me, and should treat me so coldly as you did the day of the funeral. Then I thought it was because of your grief, but now I know that it was something else. No, no, do not contradict me. I know you were surprised to find me here, and to see my wreaths, because you thought me too frivolous and childish, and heaven knows what beside, to think of what your dear dead father loved best. Can you deny it?"
"No, Adela, I will not deny that I was surprised," Walter frankly confessed; "but I cannot tell you how happy I am to find I was wrong."
"Why did you think so of me?"
"Because, Adela, you have lately seemed 'so' to me. We were always good friends until a few months ago, and then you suddenly changed your manner to me. When we rode together you talked only of new dresses, of the officers from the neighbouring garrison, of your plans and prospects for the winter, which you hoped to pass in Berlin, and of heaven knows what nonsense besides. If I tried to talk of something else, you yawned, and I felt that we no longer were in sympathy with each other. And when I called upon you in Kissingen in the summer, as I was passing through the town, instead of my old playmate I found a fashionable little lady flirting with a couple of affected fops and quite ready to make game of her old 'comrade.'"
"That is not true!" exclaimed the girl.
"Oh, yes, it is," said Walter, who had quite talked himself into a heat; "remember the day we made a party on the mountain, and you gave your shawl to Herr von somebody, and your parasol to that other fellow to carry, and when I asked whether you had nothing for me, you answered, although you must have seen that I was not in jest, 'Oh, yes: my caprices; you may have those; the youngest always ought to carry the heaviest burden.' And then you ran on laughing with the others, and we never spoke another word to each other the whole day long. Do you remember?"
"Yes; but I did not mean anything."
"Nevertheless you were ready enough to laugh with the others at your 'comrade's' discomfiture; and that laugh broke the bond between us. From that moment you were no more to me than a strange young lady; and that I forget this and tell you all that I am saying now, is due to the sight of those wreaths and of your tears."
"And when the wreaths are withered and the tears are dried, must we be strangers again?" Adela whispered softly, with a questioning glance.
"Would you have it otherwise?" he asked.