"Sleep away, then, old sinner," said Leo, clapping him on the shoulder; and as his uncle seemed unable to move from the spot, either from emotion or fright, he took him by the arm and led him with gentle care to his bed, where he covered him up with his cloak which hung near on the wall. Then he went his way whistling "Paloma." Before he sat down to his writing-table again, he ordered Christian to bring up a bottle of the oldest wine in honour of the day, and as he poured out the first glass and held it toward the youthful likeness of his friend, he said between his clenched teeth-- "Long live brute-force, little girl. It has saved both you and I to-day, from a catastrophe." The same evening the arrival of the carriage from Uhlenfelde was announced. He had not expected a visit from his friend so soon, and a thrill of joy and at the same time of alarm ran through him. The visitor clasped his hand with the old genial pressure, which dispelled at once the anxious presentiment of a moment before. But the pale face wore an excited expression, and the sunset glow which came through the windows was reflected in the feverish glitter of his tired eyes. "You are not well," said Leo, who read on the familiar features the story of recent mental excitement. That Felicitas had something to do with it, and his own homecoming, it was not difficult to guess. "Let me sit down quietly for a few minutes," Ulrich said, pressing his hand against his left side. "I shall be better soon." He refused Leo's offers of refreshment, and with short hard gasps breathed in the perfumed evening air which was wafted into the room from the garden. When Leo saw him leaning back in his old accustomed place in the corner of the sofa, his heart bounded. How often they had sat together there, making youthful plans, while the grasshoppers chirruped outside, and the solemn quavering strains of a concertina sounded from the stables! They had often touched on the subject of marriage, and had agreed that their wives must be two bosom friends, or, better still, two sisters, so that their old hearts' intimacy should not be sacrificed. Nothing seemed changed outwardly to-night. The grasshoppers chirruped; the concertina began timidly, as if uncertain whether it might dare, now the master had come home. And yet everything was different. "Still I have got _him_!" Leo's soul cried aloud. "And I will not let him slip through my fingers." "You have seen how things are now with your own eyes," Ulrich said, sitting up, "I am afraid there's not much to congratulate you upon." "I have found nothing but gross negligence," Leo assented. "If I may venture to advise you, I should get rid of the old man, despite considerations of kinship and friendship. At all events, he isn't much use to you." "I have kicked him out already," said Leo. "So much the better," Ulrich remarked. "One of his worst feats was last Saturday, when his chicanery drove away the Lithuanian reapers."