“Oh, don’t send me away!” the golden-haired girl broke out, in a voice that was positively a wail, and clasping a pair of pretty, slender hands in piteous supplication. “Where do you come from?” the old gentleman asked, much as if he expected she might suddenly jump up and bite him. “From Beijerland, mynheer,” she answered, with a sob. “So! Koosje, she is remarkably well dressed, is she not?” the professor said, glancing at the costly lace head-gear, the heavy gold head-piece, which lay on the table together with the great gold spiral ornaments and filigree pendants--a dazzling head of richness. He looked, too, at the girl’s white hands, at the rich, crape-laden gown, at their delicate beauty, and shower of waving golden hair, which, released from the confinement of the cap and head-piece, floated in a rich mass of glittering beauty over the pillows which his servant had placed beneath her head. The professor was old; the professor was wholly given up to his profession, which he jokingly called his sweetheart; and, though he cut half of his acquaintances in the street through inattention and the shortness of his sight, he had eyes in his head, and upon occasions could use them. He therefore repeated the question. “Very well dressed indeed, professor,” returned Koosje, promptly. “And what are you doing in Utrecht--in such a plight as this, too?” he asked, still keeping at a safe distance. “O mynheer, I am all alone in the world,” she answered, her blue misty eyes filled with tears. “I had a month ago a dear, good, kind father, but he has died, and I am indeed desolate. I always believed him rich, and to these things,” with a gesture that included her dress and the ornaments on the table, “I have ever been accustomed. Thus I ordered without consideration such clothes as I thought needful. And then I found there was nothing for me--not a hundred guilders to call my own when all was paid.” “But what brought you to Utrecht?” “He sent me here, mynheer. In his last illness, only of three days’ duration, he bade me gather all together and come to this city, where I was to ask for a Mevrouw Baake, his cousin.” “Mevrouw Baake, of the Sigaren Fabrijk,” said Dortje, in an aside, to the others. “I lived servant with her before I came here.” “I had heard very little about her, only my father had sometimes mentioned his cousin to me; they had once been betrothed,” the stranger continued. “But when I reached Utrecht I found she was dead--two years dead; but we had never heard of it.” “Dear, dear, dear!” exclaimed the professor, pityingly. “Well, you had better let Koosje put you to bed, and we will see what can be done for you in the morning.” “Am I to make up a bed?” Koosje asked, following him along the passage. The professor wheeled round and faced her.