It was thus that Felix found him then, and he found him but little different now, after all these years of separation--averse to all intercourse with men who did not stand in some relation or other to his art, and inaccessible, so far as his inner life was concerned, even to his few intimate acquaintances. But still the years had not passed without leaving some traces. They had so estranged him, even from that one person to whom he had then loved to unbosom himself, that, after the first outburst of his old tenderness, a steady medium temperature had set in in the relations of the two old friends, that was scarcely a degree warmer than that between Jansen and the other members of the little circle. During the long hours that the pupil spent working at his master's side, there were hundreds of opportunities to talk over old times. But the sculptor seemed to avoid all recollections of the past. Then, they had made no secret to one another of their love-affairs; and now Felix made several attempts to return to the subject of his late betrothal. But, when he did this, it was as if some dark spectre rose up before Jansen. He sought to give the conversation a general direction with some bitter sarcasm or forced jest, and soon relapsed into more sullen silence than before. Felix felt how heavily this cool reserve weighed on his spirits, which would have been none too light even without it. After the shipwreck of his happy love, he had tried to fall back upon this friendship; and now, though he had indeed found firm ground, it was no longer the green island of his youth, but bare and inhospitable; and the soil, which was then so yielding, had turned to rugged rock. One evening, as he was walking down the Briennerstrasse, alone, and not in the most cheerful spirits, he met the beautiful stranger, who now visited Angelica daily, but who was jealously guarded by the latter from all other eyes. She appeared to be returning home from a walk, and her old servant walked a few steps behind her, carrying her shawl. Felix bowed to her, and she distantly returned his salute. She evidently had not recognized him. Then he saw her enter the house, and soon afterward the corner-room on the ground-floor was lit up by the light of a lamp. It would have been easy for him to watch her proceedings through the low window. But he did not care at all to do so, though he admired her beauty. For no beautiful, no charming face could cross his path without carrying his thoughts back to his lost love, and plunging him in a melancholy reverie. And so it was to-day. And suddenly it struck him as so absurd and idiotic for him to be wandering about alone in this utterly strange city, among people who cared nothing for him, separated from her who was his only love, that he could not help bursting out into a laugh, only to sigh all the more sadly the next minute.