"The friendliness, the affectionate regard, which spoke so unmistakably out of the familiar old graybearded, sunburnt face, did her no end of good." Since she could not yet entirely believe she asked, "Is it indeed you, Justin? And you will still recognize me? And you do not flee from me?" At first the deplorable commission which the old man had to carry out threw her back again. When she had to understand that her father would not again set foot in the pastor's house until she had departed, her countenance became deathly pale and convulsive movements trembled in quick succession over her delicate body so that the old man wept aloud, for he believed that she had gone mad. His signs of distress, the faithfulness and love which spoke through them, touched her so effectually that at last the hysterical convulsion relaxed and she sank down. "The old man caught her up. He placed her on the sofa. She lay across his lap; her head lay upon his left hand, with the other he held her body fast that it should not slip to the floor. It seemed as if she would weep her whole weary self away. The old servant held her with trembling hand and heavy heart." Now the scene of childhood is complete, except that the old man plays the rôle of her father. So had Maria presumably done as a child when she felt too unhappy and so also the pastor's throwing himself down, as we saw above, over his daughter whom he believed dead, is not strange. When Maria had left the parsonage her first thought and silent concern was how her father must now live without her care, even that perhaps he would not be there any more, when everything had later turned out well. Then she thought again of the time when she would be a mother and "her life seemed to her as a tale that is told." On her journey to her new home there came over her ever more strongly "the feeling of her complete abandonment. All the dear childhood memories, into whose protection she would flee, turned in anger from her. With tears she cried to God for a heart that she might love, some one for whom she might really care. For it seemed as if a curse lay upon her, which estranged all hearts from her. She thought with fear at her heart that the being to whom she would give life might likewise turn from her, as everything had done that she loved." Then a good fate brings to her the unfortunate Johannes whom his crazy father wished to throw into the water in order to preserve him for eternal happiness. At once Maria assumes the rôle of mother toward the boy and now "that once more she had to care for some one, she was again the calm and serene being."