Meanwhile Oswald had entered the house. He came, as had been rightly guessed, to take leave, but much pressing business awaited him at home. Some preparations for his journey were yet unmade, which must be completed that day; he could therefore only pay a flying visit. A little commonplace chat ensued. The Councillor regretted much that his daughter had gone out for a walk. He had sent into the park after the truant, but presumably the man had failed to find her. Oswald, in return, expressed polite regret, begged that her father would present his kind regard to the young lady and say good-bye for him. In a brief quarter of an hour the visit was concluded. Rüstow looked on with a heavy heart at his favourite's departure, but Aunt Lina, on the other hand, drew a deep breath of relief when the carriage rolled out of the courtyard. Oswald leaned back in the corner of the barouche. He was glad that this leave-taking was over, immensely glad--or so, at least, he told himself. He had long feared this hour--feared and yet longed for it. No matter, it was best so. The farewell, which accident had denied him, would have been but one pang more, and a useless one. Now the struggle of many days and weeks was at an end; a struggle which none had witnessed, but which had shaken the young man's being to its very centre, and had threatened completely to unhinge him. It was high time he should go. Distance would enfeeble, and perhaps ultimately break, the spell; and even were it not broken, a partition-wall of defence would be erected. Now he must throw all his energy into the new life before him, must zealously work, wrestle, and, if possible, forget. While Oswald thus reasoned with himself, his heart beat wildly, despairingly, in his breast, reminding him that he had looked forward to this one last pang as to a last gleam of happiness. Was he not going--going never to return? The carriage passed the corner of the park. Oswald turned and looked back once more. There at some little distance above him, on a small wooded eminence, he caught sight of a slender girlish figure--and in a trice all the wise comfort he had been administering to himself, all his fine resolutions for the future, melted away, fell to pieces. Once more--just once! Reflection, prudence vanished at the thought. In a second Oswald had called to the coachman to stop, and had sprung out of the carriage. The man drove on to the village, with instructions to wait there. Oswald entered the park by a side-gate, and proceeded towards the raised terrace; but as he approached the goal before him, his pace slackened, and when at length he mounted the steps, and Hedwig came forward to meet him, he had fully recovered his usual calmness of demeanour. He was, as it seemed, simply obeying the dictates of courtesy which called on him to stop and say a word of leave-taking to his cousin's future wife.