What is heavier than pleasure-seeking in which one has no pleasure? I shall never forget the misery of those plans and that bustle. I dared not absent myself, and I could scarcely carry out my part for very heavy-heartedness. It seemed to me that I could not bear it, if the hour came, and I should have to drive away with all that merry party, and leave poor Mr. Langenau for a long, long day alone. I felt sure something would occur to release me: it could not be that I should have to go. With the exaggeration of youth, it seemed to me an impossibility that I could endure anything so grievous. How I hated all the careless, thoughtless, happy household! Only Richard, enemy as he was to my happiness, seemed endurable to me. For Richard was not merry-making in his heart, and I was sure he was sorry for me all the time he was trying to oppose me. Mr. Langenau was again in the Doctor's care, who came that evening, and who said to Richard, in my hearing, he must be kept quiet; he didn't altogether like his symptoms. Richard had his hands full, with great matters and small. Sophie had washed hers of the invalid; there had been some sharpish words between the sister and brother on the matter, I imagine, and the result was, Richard was the only one who did or would do anything for his comfort and safety. That day, after appearing at dinner, he came no more. I watched with feverish anxiety every step, every sound; but he came not. I knew that the Doctor's admonitions would not have much weight, nor yet Richard's opinion. I had the feeling that if he would only speak to me, only look at me once, it would ease that horrible oppression and pain which I was suffering. The agony I was enduring was so intolerable, and its real relief so impossible, like a child I caught at some fancied palliation, and craved only that. What would one look, one word be--out of a lifetime of silence and separation. No matter: it was what I raged and died for, just one look, just one word more. He had said he would never look into my eyes again: that haunted me and made me superstitious. I would _make_ him look at me. I would seize his hand and kneel before him, and tell him I should die if he did not speak to me once more. Once more! Just once, out of years, out of forever. I had thrown duty, conscience, thought to the winds. I had but one fear--that we should be finally separated without that word spoken, that look exchanged. I said to myself again and again, I shall die, if I cannot speak to him again. Beyond that I did not look. What better I should be after that speaking I did not care. I only longed and looked for that as a relief from the insufferable agony of my fate. One cannot take in infinite wretchedness: it is our nature to make dates and periods to our sorrows in our imagination.