"Another example; can you get away from it? _She_ did not get the right one either, her sweet-heart from childhood's days, a splendid young Lieutenant. He went shooting one evening, a shot hit him right in the forehead and blew his head to pieces. There he lay, a victim of the little trick God had a mind to play with him. Victoria, his bride, began to decline, a worm was preying on her, cribbling her heart like a sieve; we, her friends, could see it. Then a few days ago she went to a party, to some people named Seier; by the bye, she told me you were to have been there too, but didn't come. Be that as it may, at this party she overtaxes her strength, thoughts of her beloved rush in upon her and she is lively from sheer bravado; she dances, dances the whole evening, dances like a mad person. Then she falls, the floor turns red under her; they lift her up, carry her out, drive her home. She was near the end." The Tutor went close up to Johannes and said in a hard voice: "Victoria is dead." Johannes began fending vaguely with his arms just like a blind man. "Dead? When did she die? Do you say Victoria is dead?" "She is dead," replied the Tutor. "She died this morning, this very forenoon." He put his hand in his pocket and brought out a thick letter. "And she confided this letter to me to hand to you. Here it is. After my death, she said. She is dead. I hand you this letter. My mission is ended." And without taking leave, without a word more, the Tutor turned and strolled slowly down the street and vanished. Johannes was left with the letter in his hand. Victoria was dead. He spoke her name aloud again and again and his voice was without feeling, almost callous. He looked at the letter and recognized the writing; there were big and small letters, the lines were straight, and she who had written them was dead! Then he entered his doorway, went upstairs, found the right key to put into his latch and opened his door. His room was cold and dark. He sat down in the window and read Victoria's letter by the last of the daylight. "Dear Johannes," she wrote. "When you read this letter I shall be dead. Everything is so strange to me now, I am no longer ashamed to write to you again as though nothing had happened to prevent it. Before, while I was altogether among the living, I would rather have suffered night and day than written to you again; but now I have begun to pass away I do not think so any longer. Strangers have seen me bleed, the Doctor has examined me and found that I have only a shred of a lung left; what is there to hold me back now?