Discovering that Olga is financially embarrassed, Metta contrives to take foreign language lessons from her, but the two spend most of the funds so earned on concerts, opera, and long country excursions. On one of the latter, Metta notices that they are followed by a man. Her friend becomes distraught at the discovery and betrays that she has suffered the same experience before. The mystified younger girl on arriving at home is forbidden by her father to see Olga again or to leave the house, and presently she is visited by a psychiatrist. Under his questioning, she suddenly recalls that she has pawned the silver, following her childhood pattern, in order to redeem a gold cigarette case Olga was forced to sacrifice to momentary need. This object, a gift from an earlier beloved friend of Olga’s, is decorated with a jeweled scorpion, the zodiacal symbol of passion and death under which Olga was born. The psychiatrist delivers a subtle lecture on the destructive effects of emotional friendships between women. The mysterious man, he explains, was a detective employed by Metta’s father, who for some time has had the two girls under surveillance, and to gain legal power over Olga, has bought up her not-inconsiderable debts. Metta is to be sent to an uncle’s in the country so that separation may cure her of her unhealthy infatuation. Eventually, she is assured, she will thank her family and the doctor for having saved her from ruin. She is forced to leave Berlin without either explaining her departure or saying goodbye to Olga. At her uncle’s she sets herself one goal: to escape and return to Olga. Before long she has so ingratiated herself with the household that it is not too difficult to obtain money secretly from her uncle’s desk and to reach the railroad station. In Berlin, Olga meets her, but instead of the warm welcome Metta anticipated, she merely remonstrates against the madness of Metta’s flight and refuses to harbor her, knowing the girl will at once be tracked to her rooms. After a very bad quarter-hour, however, Metta succeeds in persuading Olga to accompany her in an impulsive flight. The two take the next train scheduled for departure and get off at a station elected by chance. In the modest hamlet so discovered they spend a few ecstatic days of veritable honeymoon.