"I did not know what to make of all that. Had Harald really promised to marry the girl? Did she, who knew his former manner of life, really believe he would keep his promise? She looked so bright and sensible, with her big blue eyes; how could she let him deceive her so? How had Harald gone about to get the better of her so completely? It troubled me day and night, until I was made sick. I should have liked so much to save the poor innocent child, and to save Harald that additional sin. But I did not know how to go about it. Since that conversation in the garden Miss Marie avoided me everywhere; the aunt did not leave her rooms till evening, and kept her head wrapped up, in spite of the warm weather. Harald had not said another word to me for days. He really seemed to have changed entirely. Since Miss Marie had been at the castle he had not been drunk once; he had not beaten the servants; he had not killed a horse by furious riding, while formerly not a day passed without some such calamity. Then he had flown into a rage upon the slightest provocation; now he was mild and kind towards everybody, only not towards myself, because he knew he could not impose on me, who had known him from childhood up,--and towards his new valet. That was a hideous creature, constantly smiling, and constantly running after the girls, who could not bear him. He had nothing to do all day long but to lounge about, his hands in his pockets, and to make faces at everybody. He did nothing for the baron since Harald had one day kicked him, so that he was disabled for a fortnight. None of us could understand why the baron did not turn him out.--During this whole time not one of the gentlemen had been here who formerly used to come and go at the castle. I had been hoping some of them might come, so that I might have a chance of speaking to Miss Marie. But Harald never left her alone. If they formerly had seemed to be fond of each other, matters were very much worse now. Whenever they thought themselves unobserved they were in each other's arms, and such kissing and caressing! Well, well, such things happen between lovers, and I did not do differently when I was a young girl, and I knew myself very well how the Barons Grenwitz flatter the girls,--but I also knew what the girls have to pay for it in the end. One fine morning, when I met Miss Marie again and asked her how she was, she turned purple and stood and trembled like an aspen leaf. When I saw that I knew what had happened, and my heart felt so heavy that I sat down on a bench and cried. When Miss Marie saw that she began to cry too, and sat down by me, and wound her arm around my neck and said: 'Don't you cry, dear Mother Claus! It will all come right!'--'God grant it, child!' said I, 'but I don't believe it'--'But,' said she, 'don't you see yourself how kind and good the baron is, and yet he is so only because he loves me, and if he did not mean to marry me, why should he have brought the aunt here? And if the