I awoke, conscious of a great luminous joy in my heart. It was full morning. “Ah,” I thought, “how bright the sunshine is! how sweet the air! To-day I will go to Veronika to-day, after my lessons—and spend the lest of the afternoon and the evening at her side!” My heart leaped at this prospect of happiness in store: and I commenced to plan the afternoon and evening in detail. At last I jumped up, eager to begin the delicious day. The trick that memory played me was a simple one, after all. The recent past had simply for the moment been obliterated, and I transported back for a moment into the old time. As I stood now in the middle of the floor, my eye was struck by the strangeness of my surroundings. “Why, how is this?” I questioned. “Where am I?” For a trice I was bewildered, but only for a trice. The truth reasserted itself all at once—rose up and faced me with its grim, deathly visage, as if cleared by a stroke of lightning. All at once I remembered; and what is more, all at once the stupor that had hung like a cloud between me and the facts, rolled away. I looked at my world. It was dust and ashes, a waste space, peopled by ghosts. My heart recoiled, sickened, horrified; then began to throb with the pain that had been ripening in its womb ever since the morning when Tikulski pointed to her, stretched murdered upon the bed. Well, at last the storm had broken; at last I realized. At last I could no longer reproach myself for a want of sensibility. At last I had my desire. I yielded myself to the enjoyment of it for the remainder of the day. For weeks afterward I lay at the point of death. The slow convalescence that ensued afforded me plenty of time to examine my position from every point of view, and to get accustomed to understanding that the light had gone out of my sky. Of course I hated the fate that condemned me to regain my health. The thought that I should have to drag out years and years of blank, aimless, joyless life, appalled me. The future was a night through which I should be compelled to toil with no hope of morning. Strangely enough, the idea of suicide never once suggested itself. When I was able to go out, I repaired to Epstein’s office. Several little matters remained to be settled with him. As I was about to leave, he said, “Neuman, do you propose to take any steps toward finding the murderer?” “Toward finding the murderer? Why, no; I had not thought of doing so.” “But of course you will. You won’t allow the affair to rest in statu quo?” “Why not?” “Why, considering your relations to Miss Pathzuol, I should think your motive would be plain. Don’t you want to see her murderer punished, her death atoned for?” “Her death atoned for! Her death can never be atoned for. And the punishment of her murderer—would that restore her to me? Would that undo the fact that she is dead? Else, why should I bestir myself about it?” “Common human nature ought to be enough; the natural wish to square accounts with him.”