I could not bring myself to pronounce it, I had so long kept it sealed up in my breast. I had two more years of imprisonment for keeping it secret; it was a poisoned weapon which I was about to use against the miserable man; but I thought of the weeping face of the dear maiden, and then I looked into the face of the evil man before me, distorted with hate and rage, and I dragged out the words through my clenched teeth--"I would mention the letter which you wrote him"--I pointed in the direction of the island--"upon which he undertook his last expedition--of the letter which proves you an accomplice, yes, the chief criminal; and which would have ruined you had I not kept the secret." The man, while I spoke, seemed to shrink into himself, as if he had trodden upon a poisonous serpent; with straining eyes he watched every movement of my hands, expecting every instant that I would carry them to my breast-pocket and produce the fatal letter. "The letter you speak of and which you have possessed yourself of by unlawful means, proves nothing," he stammered--"proves nothing at all. It is indifferent to me whether you show it to my brother, or to any one else--any one else----" "I cannot show it to any one, for I have burned it." The steuerrath almost bounded into the air. His fright had never given room for the thought that the letter might have been lost or destroyed. How differently the affair stood now! A smile of defiance passed over his face, which once more began to assume its natural color. "What are you talking of, and what do you want?" he cried, with a hoarse voice that singularly contrasted with his usual oily speech. "The devil only knows what kind of a letter it was that you saw--that you pretend to have seen. The whole affair looks exceedingly like a lie--and a very bungling one at that. Stand off, sir! don't dare to touch me, or I call for help!--and you will have to your seven years, seven years more. Do not dare to touch me, I say!" My looks were probably threatening enough, for he had retreated before them to the wall, and squeezed himself, trembling, against the espalier. I stepped up close to him' and said in a low tone: "I shall do you no harm, for--miserable wretch as you are--I still respect in you your two brothers; the one whom you hounded on to his death, and the other whose precious life you shall not embitter another hour. If no one else believes my word that I read and burned that letter, he will believe it--you know he will believe it. And if the morning of the third day finds you here, he shall learn whom he has so long been entertaining under his roof. You know him. He can pardon much, and does pardon much; but to be the victim of such a shameless lie as that which you have imposed upon him, upon the commerzienrath, and all the world--that he will never pardon." The man knew that I was right; I saw it in his face, which grew absolutely sharp and thin with alarm at being thus helplessly in my hands.