"No, no!" she exclaimed vehemently. "Not in there, not a step nearer! I'm so afraid of him, I'm afraid he will open his eyes, and ask--oh! Herr Edwin, you don't know--let me go--if I should touch a lock of his hair, I should never be able to leave his side again and I can't help being a poor stupid thing, who didn't understand him! Oh, God! my heart is breaking!" Passionate sobs checked her utterance. But when Edwin put his arm around her and kindly tried to soothe her, she broke from him and darted down the stairs like an arrow, while he stood a long time in the darkness, musing over this strange enigma, ere he again threw himself on his cold bed. CHAPTER IV. On the morning of the third day the funeral took place. Franzelius, who had undertaken to attend to all the sorrowful details, insisted that this last duty should be performed at six o'clock. "Perhaps then the preacher will oversleep himself," said he. Edwin had assented. The clergyman belonging to their ward, who as professor of theology had met Edwin at college, came the day after the event to condole with him and ask for some notes for the funeral address. "You would do me a favor," Edwin replied, "if you would merely say what is absolutely necessary, what your formula prescribes. Eulogies from a person who knew nothing of the dead, have always been repulsive to me; and besides, as my brother shared my opinions, many a word would be uttered over his open grave, against which he would protest if he could hear it." The clergyman probably thought that the softened soul of a mourner would be good soil in which to sow the seed of religion, but Edwin cut short all farther conversation, and his colleague, in by no means the best of humors, left him. Franzelius had still another reason for choosing the dark morning hour. A society of workmen, of which he was a member, wished to sing a hymn in the churchyard and could not assemble later. But he did not tell his friend a word of this. He had kept his promise, no stranger's hand had been allowed to touch the dead body. Even the most painful task, he performed himself, screwing down with his own hands the coffin lid. Then, as the bearers wound slowly down the crooked stairs with their burden, he took Edwin's arm and supported him on the last sorrowful pilgrimage.