"Yes, and my heart felt lighter when you had cleared out of it. Well, I made those two girls the confidantes of my secrets, and one day--what do you think happened? Novels were found under Käthi Greiffenstein's mattress: 'The Broken Heart,' 'The Marble Bride,' and 'Hussar's Love,' and I don't know what else. There was an awful row. Frau Lüttgen held a court-martial. Käthi denied everything. She knew nothing about the books. Some one else must have put them in her bed. Another search was made, and behold in Daisy Bellepool's bed the same discovery! But besides the books there was a packet of letters too--love-letters. To whom? Why, to me, signed Bruno Steifel.... Of course I didn't know any one called Bruno Steifel, but who believed me when I said so? Not a soul! The letters were answers to those I was supposed to have written to him, in which I had asked him to get me novels from the lending library, ... as a knightly service and testimony of his love. Wasn't it awful?" "Terrible," Leo said, biting his lips. "I was locked up, and got nothing, for two days but bread and water and slimy lentil soup. I was prayed for every morning and evening, and Laura Below bad a dream in which she saw me burning in hell. The dream was made public at a committee meeting, and I was held up as a warning example. Who knows how long it might have gone on, if I hadn't thought of a means of saving myself?" "If you want to know who Herr Bruno Steifel is,' I said, 'why not go to the library the label of which is stamped on the outside cover of the books?... They will be certain to know him there. And they did, sure enough. And who do you think it was?" "He of the fair locks, of course...." "Of course. And Frau Lüttgen goes at once to his chief and tells him the whole story. Herr Bruno Steifel is called and cross-examined. 'Have you got novels out from the library?' 'Yes,' he says, and gets horribly red. 'Are you in possession of letters?' He won't answer, but the chief threatens him with dismissal, and he produces them. The signature is: 'Your ever loving Hertha von Prachwitz,' but the handwriting is ... now guess." "Daisy Bellepool's?" "No, Käthi Greiffenstein's. Daisy Bellepool's mamma wished her daughter to have more freedom, like other American girls. So she was allowed to go out alone, and in consequence she arranged the whole business. Wasn't it disgusting?" "Yes, disgusting." "What do you think I did? I threw a jug of water at Daisy's head, and gave Käthi such a black eye that she was obliged to wear bandages for three days. So bad can you be when people behave badly to you." "And what became of the pair?" he asked.