He most clearly of all recalled her as a school-girl. Those were the days of the German bands of six and seven and even eight pieces, wandering as the hand-organs do now. And always with them came a swarm of little girls who danced when the band played, and of little boys who listened and watched. He had often followed her as she followed a band, all day on a Saturday. And he had never wearied of watching her long, slim legs twinkling tirelessly to the music. She invented new figures and variations on steps which the other girls adopted. She and her especial friends became famous among the children throughout the East Side; even grown people noted the grace and originality of a particular group of girls, led by a black-haired, slim-legged one who danced with all there was of her. And how their mothers did whip them when they returned from a day of this forbidden joy! But they were off again the next Saturday--who would not pass a bad five minutes for the sake of hours on hours of delight? And Hilda was gone from his life, was sailing away on his ship--was it not his ship? was not its cargo his hopes and dreams and plans?--was sailing away with another man at the helm! And he could do nothing--must sit dumb upon the shore. At half-past twelve he closed the shop and, after the midday dinner with his mother, went down to Brauner's. Hilda was in the room back of the shop, alone, and so agitated with her own affairs that she forgot to be cold and contemptuous to Otto. He bowed to her, then stood staring at the framed picture of Die Wacht am Rhein as if he had never before seen the wonderful lady in red and gold seated under a tree and gazing out over the river--all the verses were underneath. When he could stare at it no longer he turned to the other wall where hung the target bearing the marks of Paul Brauner's best shots in the prize contest he had won. But he saw neither the lady watching the Rhine nor the target with its bullet holes all in the bull's-eye ring, and its pendent festoon of medals. He was longing to pour out his love for her, to say to her the thousand things he could say to the image of her in his mind when she was not near. But he could only stand, an awkward figure, at which she would have smiled if she had seen it at all. She went out into the shop. While he was still trying to lay hold of an end of the spinning tangle of his thoughts and draw it forth in the hope that all would follow, she returned, fright in her eyes. She clasped her hands nervously and her cheeks blanched. "Mr. Feuerstein!" she exclaimed. "And he's coming here! What SHALL I do?" "What is the matter?" he asked. She turned upon him angrily--he was the convenient vent for her nervousness. "It's all your fault!" she exclaimed. "They want to force me to marry you. And I dare not bring here the man I love." "My fault?" he muttered, dazed. "I'm not to blame."