Probably she had only waited for this. She cast herself upon his breast, drew his head down, and whispered something in his ear. He straightened himself up with a jerk. "Are you certain?" he asked, with an unsteady voice. "Almost, I think; yes, Wilhelm, it must be so," she stammered, hiding her face on his shoulder. It was well she did not look at him at that moment. Unskilled as he was in the art of dissembling, his face expressed no pleasure at all, but only painful surprise. For weeks, but more especially since his gloomy broodings on New-Year's night, the anxious thought lay heavy on him, "What if our connection should have results?" The situation would then become so complicated that he saw no prospect of ever putting it straight again. The idea had only hitherto been an indefinite cause of anxiety--now it resolved itself into a fact which appalled him. At the same time he could not but see how happy Pilar was at the prospect, and it seemed to him unkind, even brutal, to let her have an inkling of what he felt at her news. He kissed her in silence, and pressed her hand long and warmly. "You have not said yet that you are glad," she said, and raised her eyes to his in fond reproach. "Must one put everything into words?" he returned, with an uneasy smile. "It is true," she answered; "I ought to be accustomed to your German ways by this time. But your reserve is quite uncanny to us Southerners. You are silent where our hearts simply overflow with words quite of themselves. You are content to think where we shout for joy."