Away into the open air, to field or forest, wherever nature offers solitude! This was Arno's thought; he longed to be alone, to collect himself, after the fearful blow he had received. He crossed the court-yard and hurried through garden and park into the depths of the forest. Arrived there, where he felt sure of encountering no one, he threw himself down upon the moss-carpet at the foot of a giant oak. The quiet soothed him; he needed it to aid him to control the storm of emotion within him. What had he just undergone? To his humiliation he had been harshly rejected,--rejected in a manner that wounded his pride as well as his heart. What folly his former suspicions of Anna had proved to be! He had preserved towards her a cold and chilling demeanour to convince her that her feminine arts to attract him were vain. How she must have smiled at the silly vanity for which he was now paying so dearly! And he had asked for so little, for only one ray of hope, only for permission to love her, and even this she had coldly and firmly denied him. He had thought his heart desolated by the deceit from which he had suffered years before, but the contrary was proved in the bitter pain that now tortured him. He loved, and she whom he loved scorned his affection. Was her heart no longer free? Did she love another? She had denied this; but could he believe her? He remembered all that Werner had told of her, that she had been betrothed and forsaken by her lover when her father's wealth had vanished. Could she still cling to one so worthless? No; it was impossible. She must despise such a man, and she was too noble to give affection where she could not esteem. Had Werner's studied attentions produced any impression upon her? No; her tone, in speaking of him, had been that of contempt; she saw through him,--he never could touch her heart. And yet how could "duty and honour," of which she had spoken, demand that she should reject forever a genuine devotion, and that she should declare, "We must part forever!" The claim of another upon her affection could alone make it her duty to refuse to listen to his protestations. The thought was torture. He could endure everything save that. He was a prey to a savage jealousy of this unknown who robbed him of all that could make life fair, and he had to force himself to reflect that he had not an atom of foundation for this jealousy, which, nevertheless, he could not crush out of his heart. There it was, and it would assert itself, laughing to scorn the arguments of sober reason. The sun was low in the heavens when Arno was roused from his long brooding reverie by the crackling of the underbrush, caused as he thought by some animal making its way through the thicket. But no; in a few moments there emerged upon the open space, in the midst of which stood the giant oak at whose feet he was reclining, Hauk, the chief inspector of the Hohenwald estate.