Page:Hoffmann's Strange Stories - Hoffman - 1855.djvu/111

 But let a day or two pass, and I engage that he will resume, of his own accord, his habits of every day life."

The prediction was realized. On the morrow, Krespel was very calm; he only repeated that he would make no more violins, and that he would never touch one again during his life.

All this had not enlightened me as to the mystery which enveloped the connection of Antonia with counsellor Krespel. The more I thought of it, the more some instinct unceasingly told me that there had existed between these two beings something odious to become acquainted with. Antonia always appeared to me in my dreams like a victim. I would not leave H without provoking an explanation which must, perhaps, lead to the revelation of a crime. I became excited hourly. I was about to burst, like a thunder clap, into the counsellor's closet. I found him as calm and smiling as an innocent man; seated near a little table, he was turning children's toys.

"Execrable man," exclaimed I, "how canst thou taste a moment's peace, whilst thy conscience must gnaw thy heart like a serpent's tooth?"

The counsellor fixed on me an astonished look, and, laying his chisel down by his side:—"What is the meaning of this, my very dear sir? Take the trouble to be seated."

So much coolness irritated me more; and I accused him loudly with the murder of Antonia, swearing that in my quality of advocate I would, by all the means in my power, provoke a judicial inquiry into the cause of this misfortune. My exaltation became gradually exhausted in words. When I had ended, the counsellor had not ceased to look at me very tranquilly.

"Inconsiderate youth," he then said to me, in a voice whose solemn gravity confounded me; "young man, by what right dost thou wish to penetrate the secrets of a life that was always unknown to thee? Antonia is no more! What matters the rest to thee!"