There was such an air of matter-of fact about all she said, that when--our first conversation on this theme over--she left the room, a cold sweat broke over me at the thought that my next visitor would be the “Lebendige Satan” himself. It had come to this: that I had furnished my own mind with such a subject of terror that I could not endure to be alone, and lay there trembling at every noise, and shrinking at every shadow that crossed the floor. Many and many times, as the dupe of my own deceivings, did I find myself talking aloud in self-defence, averring that I wanted to be good and honest and faithful, and that whenever I lapsed from the right path, it was in moments of erring reason, sure to be followed after by sincere repentance. It was after an access of this kind “the gray sister” found me one morning, bathed in cold perspiration, my eyes fixed, my lips livid, and my fingers fast knotted together. “I see,” said she, “he has given you a severe turn of it to-day. What was the temptation?” For a long while I refused to answer; I was weak as well as irritable, and I desired peace; but she persisted, and pressed hard to know what subject we had been discussing together. “I'll tell you, then,” said I, fiercely, for a sudden thought, prompted perhaps by a sense of anger, flashed across me: “he has just told me that you are his sister.” She screamed out wildly, and rushing to the end of the gallery, threw herself at the foot of a little altar. Satisfied with my vengeance, I lay back, and said no more. I may have dropped into a half-slumber afterwards, for I remember nothing till, just as evening began to fall, one of the servants came up and placed a table and two chairs beside my bed, with writing-materials and a large book, and shortly after, two men dressed in black, and with square black caps on their heads, took their places at the table, and conversed together in low whispers. Resolving to treat them with a show of complete indifference, I turned away and pretended to go to sleep. “The Herr Staats Procurator Schlassel has come to read the act of accusation,” said the shorter man, who seemed a subordinate; “take care that you pay proper respect to the law and the authorities.” “Let him read away,” said I, with a wave of my hand; “I will listen.” In a low, sing-song, dreary tone, he began to recite the titles and dignities of the Emperor. I listened for a while; but as he got down to the Banat and Herzégovine, sleep overcame me, and I dozed away, waking up to hear him detailing what seemed his own greatness, how he was “Ober” this, and “Unter” that, till I fairly lost myself in the maze of his description. Judging from the monotonous, business-like persistence of his manner, that he had a long road before him, I wrapped myself comfortably in the bedclothes, closed my eyes, and soon slept.