When Letitia next saw Judith she reproached her gently. Judith seemed overwhelmed by remorse. “You are quite right, dear child,” she answered. “But you see I can’t, I just can’t bear to be around sick people. They always seem to wear a mask; they don’t seem to be the same people at all; and there’s such a terrible odour. They remind one of the most frightful thing in the world--of death. You’ll reply, of course, that he’s my husband, my own husband. That makes it all the worse. It creates a tragic conflict for me. One should rather have pity on me than accuse me of things. He hasn’t the right to demand that I do violence to my nature, and as a matter of fact, he doesn’t. He’s far too subtle and too magnanimous. It’s only other people who do. Well, what do they know about us? What do they know of our married life? What do they know of my sacrifices? What do they know of a woman’s heart? And furthermore”--she went on hastily, becoming aware of Letitia’s inner estrangement from her--“so many things are happening just now, so many horrid things. My father has just arrived. I haven’t seen him since my marriage to Imhof. Do you know, by the way, that Imhof is dying? They say, too, that he’s utterly ruined. I have been spared a great deal; but wouldn’t it make you think that it is unlucky to love me? Why do you suppose that is? My life is as harmless as the playing of a little girl, and yet.... Why do you suppose it is?” She wrinkled her forehead and shivered. “Well, my father is here. There will be an interview--he, Wolfgang, and I. And oh, my dear, it’s such a hideous affair that has to be discussed.” “It concerns Christian, doesn’t it?” Letitia asked, and it was the first time that she had uttered his name in Judith’s presence. She had forgotten again and again; she had abandoned her purpose over and over. She had felt Judith’s mysterious spite and hate against her brother, and had not had the courage to face it. Always something more important and more amusing had seemed to appear on the gay stage of life. Now she repeated hesitantly: “It concerns Christian, doesn’t it?” Judith lapsed into sombre silence. But from that hour Letitia was tormented by a secret curiosity, and this curiosity forbade forgetfulness. She had lost her way. Oh, she had lost her way long ago, and daily she stumbled farther into the pathless wild. Lost, confused, entangled,--thus did she seem to herself, and she had many minutes of a fleeting melancholy. All the things that happened in her life became too much for her, and yet all the trivialities of the day disappeared as water does in sand, leaving no form, no echo, no purpose. And in these moments of her sadness, she had the illusion of a new beginning, and yearned for a hand to lead her forth from these thickets of her life. She remembered that far night when her full heart had been rejected, and nursed the ecstatic dream that now, when it was used up and a little weary, it might find acceptance.