"Perhaps a wiser man might have invented some story, and so have avoided a greater evil. There is such a thing as a necessary lie. But I held to the belief that every man is alone responsible for his acts; that I should add a second sin to the first if I burdened the pure soul of my darling with such a confidence; and so I remained unshaken, though I knew her too well not to know how much was at stake. "On the next morning I received her parting letter--a letter that for the first time showed me all that I was losing. "But I had gone too far to turn back. I answered that I would wait until she changed her opinions; that in the mean time I should look upon myself as bound to her; but she was, of course, entirely free. "That was a week ago. I reflected that of course it would be necessary to leave at once those places where she might meet me. In putting my house in order for an indefinite absence, I came upon a package of visiting-cards in one of my mother's cupboards that had on them the name of her brother, my godfather, Felix von Weiblingen. It occurred to me as a good idea that, under this name, I might for a while (_incognito_) breathe the same air with my oldest friend, and at the same time attain the goal of my dearest wishes--to begin a new life. There is nothing in me of the ordinary numbered and classified type of 'man with a calling,' and, even with the best wife in the world, I never should have been able to busy myself quietly on my estate with bringing up children, making brandy, and fox-hunting. It is better, then, that I should use this involuntary opportunity to dispose of myself as I choose, in trying whether I can't really make a life of my own. If in time she should bring herself to my way of thinking, she would then find a _fait accompli_ that she would have to accept. "It will be no shame to me in your eyes if I don't at once find my spirits so entirely in order that I can go rushing into a mastery of the fine arts by lightning express. I have reached the door of your studio but slowly, and by very short stages--but this very slowness has done me good. You see before you a thoroughly sensible man, who is determined to submit to fate without a grumble. If you will only take me into _die Mache_, it will not be long before the wings of your faithful Icarus will grow again, to lift him above all this wretched world of Philistinism and its foolish love-affairs." CHAPTER III. The sculptor had listened to this long confession in silence. And even now, when Felix ended, and began to pull to pieces a sprig of mignonette as carefully as though he were trying to count the stamens in the little blossoms, he betrayed neither by word nor look any opinion of what he had just heard.