He found his mother as he always found her: sitting in the wide, soft chair by the open window, the dark rug over the now paralysed knees, the great Bible on the sloping table before her, in the beautiful old hands the delicate figured lace at which she was sewing; and, as ever, when he came to her, she silently laid aside the fine work and folded her hands firmly in her lap as though she must collect all her will and every thought for the few minutes which the great son spent with his mother. They did not shake hands; they did not do that any more. “How are you, mother?” asked Joh Fredersen. She looked at him with eyes in which gleamed the strength of a heavenly legion. She asked: “What is it you want, Joh?” He sat down opposite her and laid his forehead in his hands. There was nobody in the great Metropolis, not anywhere else on earth who could have boasted ever having seen Joh Fredersen with sunken brow. “I need your advice, mother,” he said, looking at the floor. The mother’s eyes rested on his hair. “How shall I advise you, Joh? You have taken a path along which I cannot follow you—not with my head, and certainly not with my heart. Now you are so far away from me that my voice can no longer reach you. And if it were able to reach you, Joh, would you listen to me were I to say to you: Turn back—? You did not do it then and would not do it to-day. Besides, all too much has been done which cannot be undone, you have done all too much wrong, Joh, and do not repent, but believe yourself to be in the right. How can I advise you then...?” “It is about Freder, mother...?” “... about Freder?” “Yes.” “What about Freder....” Joh Fredersen did not answer immediately. His mother’s hands trembled greatly, and, if Joh Fredersen had looked up, the fact could not have remained hidden from him. But Joh Fredersen’s forehead remained sunken upon his hands. “I had to come to you, mother, because Hel is no longer alive....” “And of what did she die?” “I know: of me.... You have made it clear to me, mother, often and cruelly, and you have said I had poured boiling wine into a crystal. Then the most beautiful of glass must crack. But I do not repent it, mother. No, I do not repent it.... For Hel was mine....” “And died of it....” “Yes. Had she never been mine perhaps she would still be alive. Better that she should be dead.” “She is, Joh. And Freder is her son.” “What do you mean by that, mother?” “If you did not know just as well as I, Joh, you would not have come to me to-day.” Joh Fredersen was silent. Through the open window, the rustling of the walnut tree was to be heard, a dreamy, touching sound. “Freder often comes to you, mother, doesn’t he?” asked Joh Fredersen. “Yes.” “He comes to you for aid against me....” “He is in great need of it, Joh....” Silence. Then Joh Fredersen raised his head. His eyes looked as though sprinkled with purple. “I have lost, Hel, mother,” he said. “I can’t lose Freder too....”