"Yes, that's just what I always say," he then remarked. "It is not we who make our fate, but some circumstance outside us usually sees to that--some circumstance which we were not in a position to influence in any way, which we never have a chance of bringing into the sphere of our calculations. After all, do you deserve any credit...? I feel justified in putting this question, much as I respect your talent. Nor does old Eissler, whose interest in your affairs you once told me about, deserve any credit either for your being wired to from Detmold and finding your true sphere of work there so quickly. No. An innocent man, some one you don't know, had to die a sudden death to enable you to find that particular place vacant. And what a lot of other things which you were equally unable to influence, and which you were quite unable to foresee, had to come on the scene to enable you to leave Vienna with a light heart--to enable you, in fact, to leave it at all." George felt hurt. "What do you mean by a light heart?" he asked. "I mean a lighter heart than you would have had under other circumstances. If the little creature had remained alive who knows whether you...." "You can take it from me that I would have gone away, even then. And Anna would have taken it quite as much as a matter of course as she does now. Don't you believe me? Why, perhaps I'd have gone with an even lighter heart if that matter had turned out otherwise. Why, it was Anna who persuaded me to accept. I was quite undecided. You have no idea what a good sensible creature Anna is." "Oh, I don't doubt it at all. According to all you have told me about her from time to time, she certainly seems to have behaved with more dignity in her position than young ladies of her social status are usually accustomed to exhibit on such occasions." "My dear Herr Nürnberger, the position really wasn't as dreadful as all that." "Come, don't say that. For however much things may have been made easier by your courtesy and consideration, take it from me that the young lady is bound to have felt frequently during the last months the irregularity of her position. I am sure there isn't a single member of the feminine sex, however daring and advanced may be her views, who doesn't prefer in a case like that to have a ring on her finger. And it's all in favour, too, of your friend's sensible and dignified behaviour that she never allowed you to notice it, and that she took the bitter disillusionment at the end of these nine months, which were certainly not entirely a bed of roses, with calmness and self-possession." "Disillusionment is rather a mild word. Pain would perhaps be more correct." "I dare say it was both. But in this case, as in most others, the burning wound of pain heals more quickly than the throbbing piercing wound of disillusionment." "I don't quite understand."