Only a Girl: or, A Physician for the Soul.

by Wilhelmine von Hillern

The train stopped. The old lady emerged from the car, like a mole from the earth, and was greeted with a joyful exclamation from her daughter, who was waiting for her at the station.

Leuthold threw himself into a droschky, and drove to a hotel, whence he dispatched a few lines to his daughter, requesting her to come to him.

A long half-hour ensued. What would the daughter be whom he had not seen for seven years? Was she what she seemed in her letters? If she were, how should he meet her and gaze into her innocent eyes?

There was a gentle knock at the door. "Come in," he cried eagerly, and there entered a creature so lovely in her budding maidenhood that Leuthold could only open his arms to her in mute delight.

The girl stood for one moment timidly upon the threshold, and then threw herself upon her father's breast with a cry of joy,--a cry in which all the home-sickness of years was dissolved in the rapture of reunion. Closer and closer each clasped the other,--neither could utter a word. The child wept tears of joy in her father's arms, and bitter drops fell from Leuthold's eyes upon the head that he pressed to his breast as if this happiness were to be his only for a few minutes.

"Father, let me look at you," Gretchen said at last, extricating herself from his embrace. And she put her hands upon either side of his head, and gazed into his eyes with the clear, frank glance of innocence. He bore her look as he would have borne to look at the sun: it seemed to him that it must blind him, and that he should never be able to raise his eyelids again.

"Father dear, I can see how you have laboured and suffered," said Gretchen sadly. "It was high time for you to allow yourself a little relaxation. Ah, how good it is of you to come to me,--to me!" And her emotion found vent in kisses. "But the surprise!" she cried with a long breath, "the surprise! I could hardly believe my eyes when your note was handed to me. 'My father's hand,' I thought, 'and from here?' I opened the note and read,--and read,--in distinct letters, that my father was really here. I gave such a cry of delight that every one came running to know what was the matter. I was just out of bed, and would gladly have run to you in my dressing-gown! Oh, heavens! I could scarcely dress myself--everything went wrong. I should never have got through if the Fräulein had not helped me,--I was in such a hurry!" And she laughed, and cried, and threw her arms around her father again, as if she feared he might vanish from her sight. "Ah, father, what shall I call you? My own darling father, is this really you? Are you going to stay with me now for a while? Are you half as glad to see me as I am to see you?"

Thus the innocent, joyous creature overwhelmed him with love and caresses, and he, lost as he was, heard his condemnation in every one of her tender words.

Could this angel ever descend from her upper sphere to a knowledge of her father's crime? Could her pure soul ever be stained with thoughts of sin, of which as yet she had no idea, and learn to despise, as a criminal, him whom she now held dearest in the world?

But this was not all that he feared. What if his disgrace were to be visited upon his child? What if this young bud should be buried beneath the ruins of his shattered existence? Who would have anything to do with the daughter of a criminal?