At first she spoke with uncertainty, as if searching for an unequivocal purpose for this trip; then her utterance became faster and faster; at the last words she looked at the clock on the mantel. A shepherd and shepherdess of old Dresden china, looking at each other tenderly, held the dial between them. "Yes, at 3.28," she repeated. "Rita!" he caught her hand and held it firmly. "Your mother has taken this trip in order to plead for me. She has granted my wish! Quite as a diplomatic ambassador! She wished to intercede for me personally, to be my spokesman, to brush aside scruples and prejudices; to place the strange and unexpected in a proper light; to express her conviction that this desire of mine is not a whim, but a pious longing that has lain dormant in a secret corner of my heart. All this she is going to put forward in my behalf. The confidence that all have in her she will use in my favor. She is going to say to them: 'From frequent intercourse with Victor Weilen, the son of our aunt Goldine, who died at an early age, your youngest sister, Uncle Leopold, the sister of my mother,--from frequent intercourse with him we have the impression that honest feeling leads him to us; that the secret voice of blood-relationship called him, when he discovered that one of the family, the one whose quiet piety, whose honest belief make him appear doubly worthy of honor to those whom life has driven away from their native soil, had attained his ninetieth birthday, and like a patriarch was going to gather his own about him. And on this occasion Victor Weilen, too, wishes to be present.'" She looked at him in timid bewilderment. She had slowly disengaged her hand from his. "O yes! But mamma also found it necessary to supervise the arrangements for the celebration personally. There will be so many people to come to the small town. Our relatives there are, of course, helpless; they are not used to such matters. Arrangements will have to be made in advance for the housing and entertainment of the guests.... You see, it is a special festival that is to be celebrated." "Do you wish to rob me of the delight of my interpretation, Miss Rita?" There was a pained expression in his voice. "All that might have been done by correspondence, but your kind mother in person had to justify and advocate the wish of a stranger to be one of the guests, a stranger, yet one of their own blood. For this the winter's journey, to-day, on New Year's Day, which people like to celebrate together at home. Am I right, Rita?" "Yes," she answered simply. It seemed impossible to her to plead further excuses after he had discovered the honest truth. Neither spoke for some time. He gazed at her bowed head. The silence was eloquent of inner sympathy between them. The intense quiet of the room was disturbed only by the crackling of the wood fire. It cast red, quivering reflections across the light carpet covering the floor, and glanced brightly adown the girl's dress.