"Well, it may be some forty years--he would be just as old as I am, eighty-two years, hm, hm, eighty-two years--I wonder how he would look--wrinkled like me? and he was a fine fellow--yes, he was a fine fellow!" The memory of the third baron, counting upwards, seemed to have a special interest for the old woman; she let the thin brown hands, with the knitting, sink into her lap, and stared dreamily into vacancy. "A fine fellow!" she whispered once more, and her wrinkled face brightened up with a sweet smile; then two big tears slowly appeared between the cast-down lashes and rolled down the wrinkled brown cheeks, upon her wrinkled brown hands.... What was she looking at in that moment, the old woman? Did she see herself again as she was sixty-five years ago, a tall, beautiful thing, with large gray eyes full of fire, and an abundance of soft, dark blonde hair, as she stole down at night into the garden of the château, to give a rendezvous to the young baron? The wild young baron, with whom she had grown up like a sister, and whom she loved like a brother--and like her best beloved, since he vowed he would make her a baroness as soon as he was master at Grenwitz. Then she was young and he was young; and the sun shone in those days so warm and mild into her young, fresh heart, and the larks sang so merrily, and the moonlight danced about slyly in the park, and the nightingale sobbed and wailed in the shrubbery as if her full little heart was breaking with loving joy and loving pain--for alas! the young baron had gone away that morning--how far? Beyond the sea, sent to Sweden to his relations there, to make an end to that foolish story with pretty Lizzie. And he sent her not a word, not a word, for one, two, three years, and when he came back from Sweden--great God! he was not alone then--a beautiful young wife sat by his side, and the old master and mistress were delighted, and the servants cheered, and they danced and shouted for joy. But in the thickest shrubbery near the château a girl had hid herself, the prettiest of all the girls far and near, and she was sobbing gently, gently, and the tears were rolling down one by one, and from much weeping her beautiful eyes were sunk deep down, and the glorious hair had turned gray, and--there she was now sitting, an old, immensely old woman--and the tears were still rolling down, one by one, over the wrinkled brown cheeks, over the wrinkled brown hands. "A fine fellow," she said. "I have never in my life seen so fine a one again until yesterday morning, when you were suddenly standing before me on the heath. Then you looked so familiar to me, and now I know wherefore. By your leave, young master, how old are you now?" "Twenty-three!" "Twenty-three years; yes, yes, I know that, twenty-three years--you have not grown old, you are still young and fair."