Nevertheless, it was almost a relief to him when, upon inquiry at all of the three inns, he was told that no room could be had for the night. He thought at once of Rossel's little country house, of which he had often heard his friends speak. As the way was described to him, he could still arrive there in good time, and before his friends had gone to bed. So he contented himself with a hasty drink after his sultry ride through the woods, handed over his animal to a hostler, who promised to take good care of it, and got under way again. He had not had the heart to inquire for Irene's villa, though he had thought for a moment of doing so--only that he might avoid it all the more surely. But he did not allow her name to pass his lips. Clinching his teeth, he went his way, past the garden fences and walls. The warm night had enticed every living thing out into the open air. Under the vines and in the summer-houses, on garden-benches and on balconies, old and young sat, walked, and stood; and here and there one could hear the clear but subdued sound of girlish laughter, as it suddenly burst forth from whispered conversations or deep silence, like a rocket that starts instantly from a humble fire-work into the dark heaven of night. Some one was playing a cither, to which a man's voice sang a low accompaniment; from another house a full soprano voice sang Schubert's Erl King, to the loud music of a piano; and from yet another was heard a violin concerto, with a clarionet _obbligato_. All harmonized as well as the different voices of the birds in the woods, for the sounds were softened and melted into one another by the sultry night air. Involuntarily Felix stood still and listened.