"My Father,—When you read these lines I shall be afloat on board the splendid ship 'Pannonia,' as Brazilian agent of the house of Scaramelli.
"Accept my warmest thanks for your kind recommendation. The bank has advanced me two months' salary, of which I inclose a hundred gulden, with the request that you would be good enough to pay it over to the landlord of The White Ship at Pancsova. I am in debt to that amount to that poor man, and am thankful to be able to pay this sum. Heaven bless you for all your goodness to me!"
Timar breathed freely. "The man has already improved; he remembers his old debts and pays them with his savings. What a sweet thought to have brought a lost sheep back to the fold—to be the savior of an enemy who attempted one's life—to give back to him life, the world, honor, and bring to light a pearl purified of the mire in which it lay! Is not this a truly Christian act? You have a generous soul. If only the inward accuser would not reply, 'You are a murderer!'
"You do not rejoice to have saved a man, but rather at getting rid of him. If you received news that a tornado had caught your ship and sunk it with every soul on board, what joy it would give you! You are not thinking of the flour-trade with its profits and losses, but that every year in the swamps of La Plata and the river Amazon that fearful specter walks—the yellow fever—which, like the tiger, lies in ambush for the new-comer. Of every hundred, sixty fall victims to it. It is that of which the prospect gives you pleasure. You are a murderer!"
Timar felt the satisfaction of a man who has succeeded in putting an enemy out of the way—a joy with which bitter self-condemnation and anxious forebodings were mingled.
From henceforward Timar was transformed. He was hardly to be recognized. The usually cold-blooded man betrayed in everything a singular restlessness; he gave contradictory orders, and forgot an hour after what he had said. If he started on a journey, he turned back half-way; he began to avoid business, and seemed indifferent to the most important affairs; then again he grew so excitable that the smallest neglect enraged him. He might be seen wandering on the shore for half a day at a time, with his head down like one who is nearly mad, and begins by running away from home. Another time he shut himself into his room and would not let any one in; the letters which came to him from all parts lay unopened in a heap on his table. This shrewd, clever man could think of nothing but the golden-haired girl whom he had seen for the last time leaning on a tree by the island shore, with her head supported on her arm. One day he determined to return to her, and the next to drive the remembrance of her from his breast. He began to be superstitious; he waited for signs from Heaven, and visions to decide what he should do. Dreams always brought the same face, happy or sad, submissive or inconsolable, and he was more crazy than ever. But Heaven sent him no sign.
One day he decided to be reasonable and attend to his business affairs; that might perhaps steady his brain. He sat down before the heap of letters and began to open them all in turn. All that came of it was that he had forgotten at the end of a letter what he had read at the beginning. He only cared to read what was written in those blue eyes. But his heart began to beat fast when a letter fell into his hands which was heavier than the rest; he knew the handwriting of the address; it was Timéa's.
His blood ran cold. This was the sign from Heaven, this will decide the conflict in his soul.
Timéa writes to him—the angelic creature, the spotless wife. A single tender word from her will exercise an influence on her husband like a cry of "danger" to a drunken man. These well-known characters will call up the saintly face before his mind's eye, and lead him back to the right path.