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84, if anything has happened. &hellip;" "Quite enough!" "I cannot go on living. &hellip;" "Are you beginning that all over again?" Finally he hurled the sheet of paper into the drawer with that other letter which he had filled with exaggerations during a night of madness, but which he had fortunately not posted.

A week later, as he was coming home late, he heard steps behind him which sounded peculiar. He turned round with a start and the figure stood still with raised hands stretched out empty before it. While he opened the street door and stepped in he could still see it standing in the shadow. He was afraid to turn on the light in the room. While she stood out there in the dark, looking up, he was ashamed to light up the room which had belonged to her. It was raining. How many hours had she been waiting? She was probably still there, waiting with her last hope. This was more than he could stand. He was tempted to open the window, but he refrained. Then he suddenly found himself on the stairs with the key of the street door in his hand. He had just enough will power to turn back. He shut his door and undressed. "Pull yourself together, old chap!" This time it would not be so easy to extricate oneself from the affair. No doubt the girl was to be pitied, but after all it was her doing. "Above all things, I must remember my duty to myself." The next morning, having slept badly, he even held it as a grievance against her that she had once more tried to make him deviate from his proper course. Now, of all times', when his examination was imminent! It was very like her to behave in this unconscionable fashion. That scene in the night, when she had seemed like a beggar in the rain, had transformed her into a suspicious and uncanny apparition. He regarded her as definitely fallen. "Never again, not on your life!" he assured himself, and he 'decided to change his lodgings for the short time which he still had to stay, "even at a pecuniary sacrifice." Fortunately, one of his colleagues was just looking for a room. Diederich