We walked side by side along the path leading down from the Belvedere. My heart was so full that I could not speak; Paula also was silent. A twig hung across the path, so low that it would have brushed her head; I raised it as she passed, and a shower of drops fell upon her. She gave a little cry, and then laughed when she saw me confused at my awkwardness. "That was refreshing," she said. It sounded as if she were thanking me, though I had really startled her. I could not help seizing the dear maiden's hand. "How good you are, Paula," I said. "And how bad you are," she replied, looking up in my face with a radiant smile. "Good-evening!" a clear voice exclaimed close at hand. The speaker had stepped out of a hedged path that opened at right-angles to the one in which we were walking, and now stood facing us in a gay uniform, his left hand on the hilt of his sword, three white-gloved fingers raised in a foppish salute to the peak of his cap, gazing curiously at us from his brown eyes, and a half-mocking, half-vexed smile upon his face, which in the pallid evening light looked paler and more worn than ever. "Allow me to present myself," he said--his three fingers still raised to his cap--"Arthur von Zehren, ensign in the 120th. Have been at the house already; learned to my regret that my uncle is not perfectly well; my aunt is not visible; would at least not neglect to pay my _devoirs_ to my charming cousin." He said all this in a drawling, affected tone, without looking at me (who had released Paula's hand at once) or taking the slightest notice of my presence. "I am sorry that it has happened so unfortunately, Cousin Arthur," said Paula. "We did not look for you before next week." "That was my original plan," replied Arthur; "but my colonel, who is so good as to take a special interest in me, hastened the issue of my commission, so that I was able to leave yesterday, and present myself here to-day. Papa and mamma send kind remembrances to my uncle and my aunt; they will be here the beginning of next week; hope uncle will be quite restored by that time. Am curious to see him; they say he is very like my grandfather Malte, whose picture hangs in the parlor at home. Would not have known you, dear cousin; you have not the family face; brown hair and eyes is the Zehren style." The path was not wide enough for three to walk abreast; so the two went on before, and I followed at a little distance, but near enough to hear every word. I had lately been thinking of my former friend with very mixed feelings; but now as he strutted along before me at the side of that dear child, pouring his insipid chatter into her ear, calling her _thou_ and _cousin_, and just now, either accidentally or intentionally, touching her with his elbow--my feelings were very unmixed indeed. I could have wrung Master Ensign's dainty little brown head round in his red collar with extreme satisfaction. We reached the house.