The first to approach her in earnest with a proposal was Herr von Rhaden, the proprietor of Fichtkampen, a former loose-liver, and at one time a crony of old Baron Sellenthin's. He was at the end of his forties, sallow, grizzled, and gallant. Felicitas, admired as she knew herself to be, said "Yes" without much reflection. For since her thirteenth year, she had determined to take the first husband she could get, to throw herself into his arms whether he was the best or worst of men, so that she might be released from her forlorn situation by an early marriage.

Thus, at nineteen, she migrated to Fichtkampen; became mother of a son; danced, rode, made point lace, played patience, and waited for the advent of the hero whom the cards promised her. She would gladly have flirted, only the cantankerous disposition of her elderly husband would not have permitted it. First, faute de mieux, and then, really to satisfy her heart's hunger, she attracted Leo to her again. As a friend of her youth, and a second cousin, he was placed beyond her husband's jealous suspicion, and so things happened as they were bound to happen.

The famous duel which made her a widow was the climax. It would have been sheer insanity to remain a widow, and no one blamed her when, after nearly two years' mourning, she accepted the hand of the grave and high-minded Uhich von Kletzingk, although he was the bosom-friend of the man who had killed her first husband.

Now, for the first time, she was free, and enjoyed the liberty she had so long yearned for. Ulrich's patience was admirable. He guessed that a secret repugnance alienated her from him, the sickly man; as his innate refinement of feeling would not allow him to take by force what was not readily acceded, he put a bridle on his own wishes. His self-denial did not make him reproach her. She found in her husband her ready and sincerest friend, while she engaged in flirtations with the gentlemen of the country round, scoring triumphs, which fed her vanity. But happy she was not. It was part of her nature to luxuriate in feeling unhappy. It raised her in her own esteem to a higher sphere, and increased the charms of her personality. She posed to the world defenceless and lovely, with a veil of melancholy draping transparently the mystery of a soul devoured by a secret desire.

She knew perfectly well that with Leo's return a new epoch in her life had opened. Folly was at an end; her existence had become serious once more. It seemed to her clear that she didn't, perhaps never had loved him, and daily and hourly she repeated this assertion to herself, as his image rose before her again, laughing as of old, and would not be obliterated from her mind any more. He roused her animosity, at times she almost hated him; yet a gnawing, anxious curiosity drew her to him irresistibly.

During the first eight days of his return, she had given her train of admirers their congé; then she went further, and sacrificed her child. She had found a thousand ways of deceiving herself into justification of the act. She scarcely knew, and she didn't want to know, what she was doing. Even the goal that she thought to attain by it was misty and vague. Now the child had been gone nearly a second month, and a dull anxiety filled the place in her heart left empty by her motherly care for him.

One afternoon, when Ulrich was out, she took the letters from the postman, and a note from Paulchen fell into her hands which increased her anxiety. It ran--

"Dear Papa and Dear Mamma,

"It isn't nice here, and I should like to come home at once. And I am very frightened. And we have to get up at six o'clock in the morning, and then I get the morning banging from the boys, because I am the youngest. If I was not the youngest, some one else would get the banging; but, as I am the youngest, I get it. After dinner, there is the afternoon banging, and after supper, the evening blessing, and that hurts worst of all. Lotzen is the strongest boy. He can spin a top splendidly; but he does everything else badly. But he says it doesn't matter, because he is going to be a general; his uncle is a general, and that is why he will be a general, too. I should like to be a landowner. I wish I was not so frightened. How is Fido? And now I must say good-bye.

"Your