"My dear Adalbert, a man who owns an estate just outside the town-gates is always loved by a poor girl, and if I do not make an end now and send her about her business, it may very possibly come to pass that our dear Robert will take her by the hand one fine day and say to us, 'Here, papa and mamma, now be good enough to give us your blessing.' And rather than live to see that, Adalbert----" At this moment the sound of lumbering male steps was audible in the entrance-hall; directly after these came a loud and violent knock at the door. "Well!" said Mrs. Hellinger, "some one is making a noise as if the bailiffs were outside--we have not got as far as that yet." And very slowly and deliberately she said, "Come in." The old doctor stepped into the room. His hat sat awry at the back of his head, his necktie hung loose over his shoulders, and his chest heaved as with breathless running. He forgot his "Good-morning" greeting, and only gave a wild, searching glance around. "Good heavens, doctor!" cried Mr. Hellinger, senr., hastening towards him, "why, you burst in upon us like a bull into a china-shop." Mrs. Hellinger once more assumed her injured air, and muttered something about pot-house manners. When the old doctor saw the undisturbed breakfast-table and the astonished, every-day faces of his friends, he let himself drop into an armchair with a sigh of relief. Then it had not taken place after all--this terrible thing! But next moment his fears took possession of him anew. "Where is Olga?" he faltered, and fixed his gaze on the door as if he might see her enter there any moment. "Olga?" said Mrs. Hellinger, shrugging her shoulders. "My goodness, she probably will be here shortly. Are you in such a hurry?" "God be praised!" cried he, folding his hands. "Then she has been down already?" "No--not so," remarked Mrs. Hellinger, "her ladyship thinks well to sleep somewhat long this morning." "For God's sake," he cried, "has no one looked after her? Does no one know anything of her?" "Doctor, what ails you?" cried old Hellinger, who was now beginning to be alarmed. The physician may at this moment have recollected the request with which Olga's letter of farewell had closed. He felt that in this way his desire to comply with her request would, from the very first, become impossible, and made a last wretched attempt to preserve the secret. "What ails me?" he faltered, with a miserable laugh. "Nothing ails me!--What should ail me? Confound it all!" And then, casting aside all dissimulation, he cried out: "My God! my God! Thou hast permitted this terrible thing! Thou hast withdrawn Thy hand from her." And he was about to sink down weeping, but he once more gathered up all the energy still remaining in his rickety old body, raised himself bolt upright, and--"Come to Olga," he said, "and do not be terrified--however--you may--find her."